"My dear, it would have pleased him to know everybody would be there."
"I suppose so," said Theo, in a tone which was half angry and half resigned.
"We will have to take a little thought how they are to go. Lord Markland must come first, after the relations."
"Why? They never took much notice of us, and my father never liked him. I don't see why he should come at all."
"Oh yes, he will come, and your dear father would have liked it. The Warrenders have always thought a great deal of such things."
"I am a Warrender, I hope, and I don't."
"Ah, Theo, you! But you are much more like my family," she said, with a little pressure of his arm.
This did not give him so much pleasure as it did her; for, after all, however near a man may be to his mother's family, he generally prefers his own, and the name which it is his to bear. They got back under the thick shadow of the trees when the conversation came to this point, and once more it was impressed upon both that the path was very damp, and that even in June it was difficult to get through without wet feet; but Mrs. Warrender had felt herself checked by her son's reply about the alterations, and Theo felt that to betray how much he was thinking of them would be horrifying to his mother: so they both stepped into the marshy part without a word.
"You are still decided to go on Friday,—you and the girls?"
"Surely, Theo: we are all in good health, Heaven be praised! I should not feel that I had done everything if I did not go."