"I can't pretend to make a jest of what I'm going to say," she said, with a look at Coryston. "I wanted to speak to you all on a matter of business—not very agreeable business, but necessary. I am sure you will hear me out, and believe that I am doing my best, according to my lights, by the family—the estates—and the country."
At the last slowly spoken words Lady Coryston drew herself up. Especially when she said "the country," it was as though she mentioned something peculiarly her own, something attacked which fled to her for protection.
Marcia looked round on her three brothers: Coryston sunk in a big gilt chair, one leg cocked over the other, his fingers lightly crossed above his head; James with his open brow, his snub nose, his charming expression; and Arthur, who had coaxed Lady Coryston's spaniel on to his lap and was pulling his ears. He looked, she thought, bored and only half attentive. And yet she was tolerably certain that he knew no more than she did what Was going to happen.
"I am quite aware," said Lady Coryston, resuming after a pause, "that in leaving his estates and the bulk of his fortune to myself your dear father did an unusual thing, and one for which many persons have blamed him—"
Coryston's cocked leg descended abruptly to the ground. Marcia turned an anxious eye upon him; but nothing more happened, and the voice speaking went on:
"He did it, as I believe you have all recognized, because he desired that in these difficult times, when everything is being called in question, and all our institutions, together with the ideas which support them, are in danger, I should, during my lifetime, continue to support and carry out his ideas—the ideas he and I had held in common—and should remain the guardian of all those customs and traditions on his estates which he had inherited—and in which he believed—"
Coryston suddenly sat up, shook down his coat vehemently, and putting his elbows on his knees, propped his face on them, the better to observe his mother. James was fingering his watch-chain, with downcast eyes, the slightest smile on his gently twitching mouth; Arthur was measuring one ear of the spaniel against the other.
"Two years," said Lady Coryston, "have now passed since your father's death. I have done my best with my trust, though of course I realize that I cannot have satisfied all my children." She paused a moment. "I have not wasted any of your father's money in personal luxury—that none of you can say. The old establishment, the old ways, have been kept up—nothing more. And I have certainly wished"—she laid a heavy emphasis on the word—"to act for the good of all of you. You, James, have your own fortune, but I think you know that if you had wanted money at any time, for any reasonable purpose, you had only to ask for it. Marcia also has her own money; but when it comes to her marriage, I desire nothing better than to provide for her amply. And now, as to Coryston—"
She turned to him, facing him magnificently, though not, as Marcia was certain, without trepidation. Coryston flung back his head with a laugh.
"Ah, now we come to it!" he said. "The rest was all 'but leather and prunella.'"