"How is your appetite?" he asked.
"I suppose I am not enough in the open air and stirring about, to have it very good."
"Have you much strength for 'stirring about'?"
"Not much."
"People cannot have strength without eating. Rotha, what time do you give your mother her dinner?"
"Now," said Rotha. "I put the kettle on just as you came in."
"I saw you did. But what is the connection, may I ask, between dinner and the tea kettle?"
"Rotha makes me a cup of tea," said Mrs. Carpenter smiling. "I can hardly get along without that."
"Ah!—Mrs. Carpenter, I have had a busy morning and am—which I am sorry you are not—hungry. May I take a cup of tea with you?"
"Certainly!—I should be very glad. Rotha, set a cup for Mr. Digby, dear. But tea is not much to a hungry man," she went on; "and I am afraid there is little in the house but bread and butter."