"Yes. He's remarkably well and active ..." his aunt replied, paused again, and then concluded firmly, "but you will see him at dinner."
Arthur noted again that effect of some unstated contingent.
Possibly his aunt, also, was a trifle uneasy about the old man's health.
"I've really finished at last, Aunt Hannah," he said, with a smile.
She did not return the smile, but rose at once with an appearance of relief. Arthur felt as if he ought to apologise for having bored her.
His cousin Hubert greeted him, as Arthur had expected, without enthusiasm. He turned almost at once to the Hon. Charles Turner, hoping that there he might perhaps find some kind of response.
Turner was a small man whose age might have been anything between sixty and seventy, but he at least, obviously took trouble over his dress, and his rather elvish face was crinkled into an expression that gave promise of a rather satirical humour. Once or twice Arthur had caught Turner's gaze resting upon him with a slightly quizzical look.
"You've gone in for medicine, I hear," Turner began, and without waiting for a reply, continued: "Depressing kind of profession, isn't it? Always listening to other people's complaints?"
Arthur had never considered that aspect of the doctor's life. "Oh! I don't know," he said. "There are other things besides diagnosis. I mean...."
"Oh! quite," Turner cut in; "but you're always with sick people. That's what you're for. Don't you find yourself getting in the way of looking at every one as a possible patient?"