“You don’t mind Mrs Percy going home alone, I hope?” she said, half anxiously.
It had never struck me that there was anything to mind!
“Oh, of course not,” I said.
Evey looked a little sorry, but walked on.
“I didn’t mean—” she began. “At least, I only meant—” then her face cleared. She evidently thought she had hit upon an explanation of my indifference. “I see,” she said; “it must be quite different when one is an only child. Your mother must be alone, sometimes; it isn’t like ours. You see there are such a lot of us; she would feel quite miserable if there weren’t some of us with her. At least, she says so,” and Evey laughed merrily.
“Perhaps,” I said, half mischievously, “she says it a little out of politeness. I think grown-up people all do like to be alone sometimes.”
We both laughed at this, and then the remains of shyness that had hung about seemed quite to disappear. But I did not forget Evey’s gentle anxiety about mamma.
We soon came up to the others, who were all walking on slowly together—such a party they looked! Captain Whyte and old Mr Bickersteth in front, then Lady Honor and the big boy, Lancey, and the two smaller sailor-suits, Tot and Douglas, as Evey had called them, now joined by Charley, bringing up the rear.
“What a lot of you there must be when you are all together,” I exclaimed, not very politely, I am afraid, to Evey. She smiled, as if she thought it rather a compliment.
“Yes,” she said—we were walking rather more slowly now to get back our breath, as Lady Honor had nodded back to us to show it was all right—“yes, eight are a good many, and somehow, so many being boys, makes it seem even more—in the house above all. Boys can’t help being noisy, you see.”