Anne rarely argued seriously with this sister-in-law, who, despite their differences, was very dear to her. Her delight was, like the cuttle-fish, so to obscure the whole atmosphere of a discussion with mistiness of vague analogy as to enable her to retreat with honor.
“Good gracious!” Margaret went on, fanning herself violently, as she did in all weather, and amuseingly indicating by her use of the fan her own moods, “what did I say to bring out all this nonsense? I think I—yes—what was it, Rose?”
Any one’s irritation, of which she herself seemed to be the cause, troubled the little lady, especially if Anne were the person involved. Nevertheless, no experience sufficed quite to keep Mrs. Lyndsay out of these risks when her motherly instincts were in action.
Rose smiled, as she replied:
“Dear little mother, Aunt Anne objects to your criticism of her form of sport, and the naughty aunty is raising a dust of words, in which she will scuttle away.” As she spoke she cast a loving arm around her mother, and one on her aunt’s thin shoulders. But Margaret Lyndsay had the persistency of all instinctive beings.
“I think it bad for the boys. I always shall think it bad. Dick is now too fond of ridiculing serious things, and they think whatever you do is right, and whatever you say they think delightful. As for Ned—”
“Ned! my Ned! That boy is an angel. I won’t have a word—”
“As if I did not know it!” said Margaret, with the nearest approach to wrath of which she was capable. “Really, Anne Lyndsay, may I not even praise my own boys?”
“I think, my dear Margaret, you lack imagination,” said Anne. Like a great algebraist, who is apt to skip in his statements a long series of equations, she was given to omitting the logical steps by which her swift reason passed to a conclusion satisfactorily true for her, but obscure enough to her hearers.
“I don’t understand,” said Mrs. Lyndsay.