“I know you're only teasing me, but I don't care. I think nearly everything is so much more important than mere clothes, don't you?”
“No,” said Stella. “You can see I don't.”
Janet persevered. “Oh, I know you only say that! Guy has been showing me a design for an overmantel. I think it's marvellous. I should never have thought of green marble. I'm not really a bit artistic. You'd shriek if you saw my attempts at drawing! It's funny, really, because Agues used to sketch beautifully, and of course she has awfully good taste. By the way, mother rang her up as soon as she heard, and she sent her love, and said to tell you all how sorry she is. She'd have come down, only that Baby's cutting a tooth, and she doesn't like to leave him.”
“I shall give that baby an expensive christening present,” said Guy in a burst of gratitude.
Janet giggled. “You are mad! You know he was christened ages ago, the dear mite! Why, he's actually six months old now! It doesn't seem possible, does it?”
As neither Stella nor Guy could think of anything to say in answer to this a silence fell. Janet broke it, saying in a lowered voice: “It's funny, isn't it, the way one simply can't help talking of ordinary, everyday things even when something awful has happened? I suppose it is that one just doesn't realise it at first.”
“No, I think it is that uncle didn't really matter to any of us,” replied Stella thoughtfully.
“Oh, Stella, how can you?” cried Janet, shocked.
“But it's perfectly true,” Stella said, resting her chin in her cupped hands, and wrinkling her brow a little. “When he was here he made himself felt because for one thing he was a domestic tyrant, and for another he had a pretty strong personality. But he didn't matter to us because we didn't like him.”
“I'm sure I was always very fond of him,” said Janet primly.