"You will be surprised to hear that we are by way of being great friends. Her ladyship visits me in my chambers——"
Again Elinor uttered that startled cry, "John!" but she tried this time to cover it with a tremulous laugh. "Are you becoming a flirt in your old age?"
"It appears so," said John. And then he added, "That aphorism, which struck you as it struck me, Elinor, by its good sense—about the heir to a peerage—is really her production, and not mine."
"Miss Dolly's? And what was the aphorism, Uncle John?" cried Philip.
"No, it was not Miss Dolly's, my young man. It was the mother's, and so of course does not interest you any more."
It did not as a matter of fact: the old lady was supremely indifferent to Pippo; but as he looked up saying something else which did not bear upon the subject, it occurred to the boy, as it will sometimes occur by the merest chance to a young observer, to notice his mother. She caught his eye somehow in the most accidental way; and Pippo was too well acquainted with her looks not to perceive that there was a thrill in every line of her countenance, a slight nervous tremble in her hands and entire person, such as was in no way to be accounted for (he thought) by anything that had been said or done. There was nothing surely to disquiet her in dining at Uncle John's, the three alone, not even one other guest to fill up the vacant side of the table. Philip had himself thought that Uncle John might have asked some one to meet them. He should have remembered that he himself, Philip, was now of an age to dine out, and see a little society, and go into the world. But what in the name of all that was wonderful was there in this entertainment to agitate his mother? And John Tatham had a look—which Philip did not understand—the look of a man who was successful in argument, who was almost crushing an opponent. It was as if a duel had been going on between them, and the man was the victor, which, as was natural, immediately threw Philip violently on the other side.
"You're not well, mother," he said.
"Do you think not, Pippo? Well, perhaps you are right. London is too much for me. I am a country bird," said Elinor, with smiling yet trembling lips.
"You shall not go to the theatre if you are not up to it," said the boy in his imperious way.
She gave him an affectionate look, and then she looked across the table at John. What did that look mean? There was a faint smile in it: and there was a great deal which Philip did not understand, things understood by Uncle John—who was after all what you might call an outsider, no more—and not by him, her son! Could anything be so monstrous? Philip blazed up with sudden fire.