But however sorry she was for them she could not allow them to dictate to her in matters that concerned her and Anthony alone. If they were so worried, about the scandal, why hadn't they the sense to see that the only way to meet it was to give it the lie by taking Ronny, by behaving as if Ronny were unquestionably Bartie's daughter and their niece? They were bound to do it, if not for Vera's sake, for the dear little girl's sake. And that was what Vera had been thinking of; that was why she had trusted them.
But her three sisters had always disliked Vera. They disliked her because, while they went unmarried, Vera, not content with the one man who was her just and legal portion, had taken another man whom she had no right to. And Auntie Emmeline had been in love with Ferdie.
Still, there was a certain dreadful truth in their reproaches; and it stung. Frances said to herselv that she had not been wise. She had done a risky thing in taking Ronny. It was not fair to her children, to Michael and Nicholas and John. She was afraid. She had been afraid when Vera had talked to her about Nicky and Veronica; and when she had seen Veronica and Nicky playing together in the apple-tree house; and when she had heard Ronny's voice outside the schoolroom door crying, "Where's Nicky? I want him. Will he be very long?"
Supposing Veronica should go on wanting Nicky, and supposing Nicky--
Frances was so worried that, when Dorothy came striding across the lawn to ask her what the matter was, and what on earth Grannie and the Aunties had been gassing about all that time, she told her.
Dorothy was nineteen. And Dorothy at nineteen, tall and upright, was Anthony's daughter. Her face and her whole body had changed; they were Anthony's face and body made feminine. Her little straight nose had now a short high bridge; her brown eyes were keen and alert; she had his hawk's look. She put her arm in Frances's, protecting her, and they walked up and down the terrace path, discussing it. In the distance Grannie and the Aunties could be seen climbing the slope of the Heath to Judges' Walk. They were not, Dorothy protested, pathetic; they were simply beastly. She hated them for worrying her mother.
"They think I oughtn't to have taken Ronny. They think Nicky'll want to marry her."
"But Ronny's a kid--"
"When she's not a kid."
"He won't, Mummy ducky, he won't. She'll be a kid for ages. Nicky'll have married somebody else before she's got her hair up."