“Could you be called Paris or London?” said Dora.
“Oh, yes, I expect so,” said Florence, with a sigh.
“All things are possible to him that believeth,” said Miss Lacy.
“What do you think of our names?” said Tullia. “It is another case of the sins of the father.”
Florence contracted her brows as if in sympathy with them.
“What would you all like to be called?” said Jessica.
“Any ordinary names,” said Tullia, “that left our personalities free to go their natural way.”
“You might be called York or Constantinople,” said Julius.
“No, I don’t think so, Julius,” said Miss Lacy. “Think again.”
“Julius has thought enough,” said Thomas.
“Dora is an ordinary name,” said Julius, in a tone of congratulation to his sister.
“I don’t think Theodora is, but I don’t mind about my name.”
“I think that is wise,” said Jessica.
“I feel that Terence is a good name for me,” said the bearer of it. “An ordinary name might make me seem unmanly. I could not carry off Thomas.”
Florence gave him a faint smile.
“Why not regard a name as something that separates us, for the convenience of other people?” said Jessica.
“That is what we should like to do,” said Tullia, “but we were not given the chance. Our names do other things in spite of us.”
“You must not reproach your father, Tulliola,” said Thomas. “He would have nothing ordinary for you.”
Tullia put her arm in his, and Florence’s eyes swept over them.
“Are you talking about names?” said another voice. “Then what do you say to going through life under the blight of Susan, and the secondary one of Sukey?”
“The latter is a name that does what may be required of it,” said Miss Lacy.
“Well, some people have liked my funny little name for me. I believe a good many people have.”
“Anyone would like the name, Sukey,” said Florence.
“Do you think so, my dear?” said Sukey, coming to shake hands. “There is a pleasant word for me, for the first one that I hear. It makes me feel that I shall hear some more, and that we may like other things about each other.”
Florence looked at the speaker’s face, because she had no choice, continued to look in spite of herself, cast a glance at Jessica and dropped her eyes.
“You see the likeness between my sister and me?” said Sukey.
“No, I don’t see much. I never think people are really like one another.”
“But you notice the family likeness?”
“Oh, family likeness,” said Florence, almost to herself.
“It is true that it may not go far down,” said Thomas.
“Looks are only skin deep,” said his wife.
“It is beauty that is said to be that,” said Tullia. “I never know why it is not said of the other thing. It seems rather unfair on either side.”
“A pleasant surface makes us think there are pleasant things underneath,” said Sukey. “I could never believe that is not the case.”
Florence turned to Terence and spoke as if she could not suppress the words.
“What a pity that a name like Sukey belongs to anyone but your mother!”
“Why? Do you like the name very much?”
“It ought to go with a face that has her sort of look in it. It is a look that puts her apart from other people, and yet on a level with them. I have never seen a face like hers.”
“My aunt is thought to have more beauty.”
“Yes, I daresay she has that.”
“It is not such a common thing.”
“No, but it might belong to anyone,” said Florence, resting her eyes on Tullia. “And here it seems to belong to so many people.”
“You know my aunt is a great invalid?”
“Yes, Aunt Emma told me, but that is an accidental thing. We cannot think of people in terms of a chance.”
Terence was silent, looking into her face.
“Well, we will not talk of sad things on your friend’s first day with us,” said Sukey’s voice. “And that only means that we must not talk about me. There is nothing else sad in this house. All is happy and careless and free, and only asks for sympathy with joy. It is only if anyone needs a word on any other ground, that I would suggest seeking my room and my companionship. Not that there is only sadness to be met with there. I am a resolute person and keep my own ways, even on the threshold of — well, we need not say of what.”
“Aunt Sukey should insult us to our faces, if she does it at all,” said Terence.
“She did it in our hearing,” said Thomas. “We will not complain.”
Florence’s lips just parted in a smile, but she did not raise her eyes.
Benjamin came from the back of the hall, having remained in the house since his hour with his sister. Miss Lacy lifted Florence’s hand towards him.
“This is my little niece, Mr. Donne,” she said, hardly looking at either.
“And this is an elderly man in whom she can take no interest,” said Benjamin, shaking hands with the guest and producing no sign of disagreement.
“But here are the man’s children, in whom she can,” said Sukey.
Florence turned towards the gate with a faintly sighing movement, as it admitted the further addition to her new friends.
Anna led the way with her usual hurrying step, looking neither to one side nor the other. Bernard and Reuben advanced together, with Jenney on Reuben’s other side. Esmond and Claribel walked apart, in an aloofness that extended to each other.
“Now I should manage the introductions, as I am responsible for the need of them,” said Miss Lacy. “I must present my niece, Florence, to Miss Bell and Miss Jennings; and add that these are Bernard, Anna, Esmond, and Reuben Donne, to the best of my conviction and remembrance.”
“I think that a duty to convention is best performed in the ordinary way,” said Anna to Sukey. “Miss Lacy seems to manage to make people look a little ridiculous. I should not like to be left to her tender mercies in the larger matters of life.”
“You could depend on her in those,” said Sukey. “It is on the surface that she presents this front, and we have all got rather fond of it.”
“No, I am not quite with you, Aunt Sukey,” said Anna, shaking her head. “I don’t put her on a level with you and Aunt Jessica.”
Sukey did not say that her niece had exaggerated her requirements.
“How many new people has she had to see?” said Dora, with a pointing movement towards Florence.
“Fourteen,” said the latter, with unexpected precision, in a tone of polite response to Dora.
“Dora is young to concern herself with another person’s point of view,” said Bernard.
“I always think of what people are thinking,” said Dora. “If they didn’t think, they wouldn’t be people.”
“Now, Miss Jennings, how do you do?” said Miss Lacy, making a deliberate way towards Jenney. “I have promised myself a talk with you. I want to take advantage of your experience of the young, now that I have a young creature of my own to supervise and satisfy.”
“How do you do, Miss Lacy?” said Jenney, shaking hands and going no further.
Florence rested her eyes on Jenney’s face, transferred them to Jessica’s, as if expecting something in common, swept them over the other faces and brought them to rest on Sukey’s, surprised to find what she sought.
“Now you two children must run to the nursery,” said Jessica. “Your luncheon will be brought up there. There is no room for you at the table.”
“Shall we have the same things?” said Julius.
“Yes, I will see to it myself. Father will carve for you at the same time as the others,” said Jessica, who never despoiled the young.
Julius and Dora ran to the door, welcoming the prospect of freedom without a price.