“It’s too bad, Aggie. I used to think that you were fond of Katherine, that you wished her happiness—Now, ever since her engagement, you’ve done nothing but complain about her. Sometimes I think you really want to see her unhappy. We ought to be glad, you and I, that she’s found someone who will make her happy. It’s all your selfishness, Aggie; just because you don’t like Philip for some fancied reason ... it’s unfair and wicked. At anyrate to me you shan’t speak against Katherine and Philip.... I love Katherine, even though you don’t.”
Now it happened that, as I have said elsewhere, Aggie Trenchard loved her niece very deeply. It was a love, however, that depended for its life on an adequate return. “That young man has turned Katherine against me. Ever since he first came into the house I knew it.” Now at her sister’s accusation her face grew grey and her hands trembled.
“Thank you, Betty. I don’t think we’ll discuss the matter. Because you’re blind and know nothing of what goes on under your nose is no reason that other people’s sight should be blinded too. Can’t you see for yourself the change in Katherine? If you loved her a little more sensibly than you do, instead of romancing about the affair, you’d look into the future. I tell you that the moment Philip Mark entered this house was the most unfortunate moment in Katherine’s life. Nothing but unhappiness will come of it. If you knew what I know—”
Aunt Betty was, in spite of herself, struck by the feeling and softness in her sister’s voice.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“I mean nothing. I’m right, that’s all. You’re a silly, soft fool, Elizabeth, and so you always were. But Harriet ... asking him to go down to Garth with us, when she hates him as I know she does! I don’t know what it means. Do you suppose that I don’t love Katherine any longer? I love her so much that I’d like to strangle Mr. Philip Mark in his sleep!”
She flung from the room, banging the door behind her.
Philip arrived on the evening before the departure into the country. He came well pleased with all the world, because his Manchester relations had liked him and he had liked his Manchester relations. Viewed from that happy distance, the Trenchards had been bathed in golden light. He reviewed his recent agitations and forebodings with laughter. “Her family,” he told his relations, “are a bit old-fashioned. They’ve got their prejudices, and I don’t think they liked the idea, at first, of her being engaged—she’s so valuable. But they’re getting used to it.” He arrived in London in the highest spirits, greeted Rocket as though he had been his life-long friend, and going straight up to his room to dress for dinner, thought to himself that he really did feel at home in the old house. He looked at his fire, at the cosy shape of the room, heard a purring, contented clock ticking away, thought for a moment of Moscow, with its puddles, its mud, its dark, uneven streets, its country roads, its weeks of rain.
“No, I’ve found my place,” he thought, “this is home.”