"No," said mamma, languidly, and looking wonderingly at him with her large pretty eyes. "I don't very much—I don't quite know—I have an affection for her."
"You don't love her, and you don't even like her, but you have an affection for her," laughed papa.
"You are so teasing. I did not say that; what I mean is, she has a great many faults and oddities, and I don't like them—but I have an affection for her. Why should it seem so odd to you that one should care for one's relations? I do feel that for her, and there let it rest."
"Well, but it ought not to rest there—as you do like her."
"Why, dear—have you heard anything of her?"
"No; but there is one thing I should not object to hear about her just now."
"One thing? What do you mean, dear?"
"That she had died, and left us her money. I know what a brute I am, and how shocked you are; but I assure you we rather want it at this moment. You write to her, don't you?"
"N-not very often. Once since we saw her at Naples."
"Well, that certainly is not very often," he laughed. "But she writes to you. You thought she seemed rather to like us—I mean you?"