He couldn't believe it. "Oh! surely a lot more than that," he protested. "About nine or ten, I thought."
"Jubilee year," Miss Kenyon affirmed quietly, but with an air of final authority. "In August."
Arthur did not care to contradict her again, but he was still unconvinced. "Was it really?" he asked. "Astonishing how one forgets!"
Miss Kenyon was not to be deceived by this simulation of agreement.
"Don't you remember, Hannah?" she asked, turning to her sister-in-law, who had sat down near them, and was apparently brooding over the emptiness of life.
Mrs Kenyon started. "Remember, Esther? Oh! when Arthur came before," she said. "Not very distinctly, I am afraid. But he was quite a little fellow, in a holland tunic. I remember that because he got himself very dirty one morning, and poor Emily hadn't got a change for him."
Miss Kenyon nodded calmly. "In any case," she remarked, "we can verify the date without difficulty. I shall have a note of it in my diary."
"Esther is always accurate in her facts," her sister-in-law murmured. "Her memory is simply wonderful."
Miss Kenyon did not acknowledge this compliment. She was looking out through the great bay-window that was one of the principal features of the room in which they were sitting. Her expression was one of conscious authority—supreme, unquestionable.
Arthur felt snubbed, and, for the moment could think of no other suitable topic of conversation. Perhaps it would be advisable to admit that he was wrong, before he tried another subject.