Nathaniel, having shaken hands in a perfunctory fashion with Miss Dean, and said "Oh!" dampingly to her announcement that she simply loved coming to spend Christmas in his perfectly fascinating house, lost no time in whisking himself and Edgar Mottisfont into his study.
"Remind me some time to give you some hints and tips on how to put yourself over with your Uncle Nat," Mathilda said kindly to Miss Dean.
"Blast you, shut up!" snapped Stephen. "God, I wonder why I came?"
"Probably because you couldn't think of anywhere else to go," said Mathilda. Catching sight of Joseph's absurdly dismayed countenance, she added: "Anyway, now you are here, behave yourself! Would you like to go up to your room now, Valerie, or have tea first?"
Miss Dean, whose major preoccupation in life was the possibility of her hair becoming disarranged, or her complexion impaired, chose to go to her room. This put Joseph in mind of his wife, but by the time he had run her to earth in the drawing-room, Mathilda had escorted Valerie upstairs.
Maud, gently chided by Joseph for not having come out to welcome the visitors, said that she had not heard their arrival. "I have a very interesting book here," she said. "I got it out of the library today. It is the one you or Nat had out a little while ago, and which you thought I should not care for, about the poor Empress of Austria. Fancy, Joseph! She actually rode in a circus!"
Joseph, who possibly had a very fair idea of what the company would have to suffer from his wife's perusal of this, or any other, book, suggested tactfully that it should be put away until after Christmas, and reminded her that she was Valerie's hostess, and should have showed her the way to her room.
"No, dear," replied Maud. "I'm sure I had nothing to do with inviting Valerie here. Nor do I see why I shouldn't read my book at Christmas as well as at any other time. She could sit on her hair. Fancy!"
There did not seem to be much hope of dragging Maud's attention away from the Empress's peculiarities, so, with a fond pat on her shoulder, Joseph bustled away again, to irritate the servants by begging them to put tea forward, and to trot upstairs to tap on Valerie's door, and ask if she had everything she wanted.
Tea was served in the drawing-room. Maud laid aside the Life of the Empress Elizabeth of Austria, and poured out. She sat on the sofa, a dump of a woman behind a staggering array of embossed silver, and when each of the visitors came into the room, she extended her small plump hand with the same mechanical smile, and the same colourless phrase of welcome.
Mathilda sat beside her, and laughed when she saw the title of the book Maud had been reading. "Last time I was here it was the Memoirs of a Lady-in-Waiting," she said, teasing Maud.
Mockery slid off the armour of Maud's self-sufficiency. "I like that kind of book," she replied simply.
When Nathaniel came in with Edgar Mottisfont, Stephen dragged himself out of a deep armchair, saying ungraciously: "Got your chair, uncle."
Nathaniel accepted this overture in the spirit in which it was presumably meant. "Don't disturb yourself, my boy. How have you been keeping?"
"All right," Stephen said. He added, with a further effort towards civility: "You look very fit."
"Except for this wretched lumbago of mine," Nathaniel said, not quite pleased that Stephen should have forgotten his lumbago. "I had a touch of sciatica yesterday, too."
"Bad luck," said Stephen.
"The ills the flesh is heir to!" said Mottisfont, shaking his head. "Anno domini, Nat, anno domini!"
"Nonsense!" said Joseph. "Look at me! If you two old fogies would take my tip, and do your daily dozen every morning before breakfast, you'd feel twenty years younger! Knees bend - touch your toes - deep breathing before the open window!"
"Don't be a fool, Joe!" growled Nathaniel. "Touch my toes indeed! "Why, there are some mornings when I should be set fast if I stooped an inch!"
Miss Dean offered her contribution to the discussion. "I do think exercises are the most ghastly bore, don't you?"
"Shouldn't be at your age," said Nathaniel.
"A dose of salts every morning would do most people a great deal of good," said Maud, handing a cup-andsaucer to Stephen.
Nathaniel, after casting a malevolent look at his sisterin-law, at once began to talk to Mottisfont. Mathilda gave a gurgle of laughter, and said: "Well, that's settled that topic, at any rate!"
Maud's pale eyes met hers, uncomprehending, devoid of any hint of humour. "I find salts very beneficial," she said.
Valerie Dean, who was looking entrancingly pretty in a jersey-suit which exactly matched the blue of her eyes, had been taking stock of Mathilda's tweed coat and skirt, and had reached the conclusion that it did not become her. This made her feel friendly towards Mathilda, and she moved her chair nearer to the sofa, and began to talk to her. Stephen, who seemed to be making a real effort to behave nicely, joined in his uncle's conversation with Mottisfont, and Joseph, radiant now that his party looked like being a success after all, beamed on everyone impartially. So patent was his satisfaction that Mathilda's eyes began to twinkle again, and she offered, after tea, to help him to hang up his paper-chains.
"I'm glad you've come, Tilda," Joseph told her, as she gingerly mounted the rickety steps. "I do so want this party to go well."
"You're the World's Uncle, Joe," said Mathilda. "For God's sake, hang on to these steps! They feel most unsafe to me. Why did you want this family reunion?"
"Ah, you'll laugh at me if I tell you!" he said, shaking his head. "I think, if you hang your end just above that picture it would just reach to the chandelier. Then we could have another chain over to that corner."
"Just as you say, Santa Claus. But why the reunion?"
"Well, my dear, isn't it the season of goodwill, and isn't it all working out just as one hoped it would?"
"Depends what you hoped," said Mathilda, pressing a drawing-pin into the wall. "If you ask me, there'll be murder done before we're through. Nat's patience will never stand much of little Val."
"Bosh, Tilda!" said Joseph roundly. "Bosh and nonsense! There's no harm in the child, and I'm sure she's pretty enough to eat!"
Mathilda descended the steps. "I don't think that Nat prefers blondes," she said.
"Never mind! It doesn't matter what he thinks of poor little Val, after all. The main thing is that he shouldn't carry on a silly quarrel with old Stephen."
"If I'm to fix this end to the chandelier, move the steps over, Joe. Why shouldn't he quarrel with Stephen, if he wants to?"
"Because he's really very fond of him, because quarrelling in families is always a pity. Besides-"Joseph stopped, and began to move the steps.
"Besides what?"
"Well, Tilda, Stephen can't afford to quarrel with Nat, the silly fellow!"
"You should worry!" said Mathilda. "You aren't going to tell me that Nat has at last brought himself to make a will? Is Stephen the heir?"
"You want to know too much," said Joseph, giving her a playful smack.
"Sure I do! You're very mysterious, aren't you?"
"No, no, upon my word I'm not! I only feel it would be very foolish of Stephen to go on being on bad terms with Nat. Shall we hang this big paper-bell under the chandelier, or do you think a bunch of mistletoe would be better?"
"If you really want my opinion, Joe, I think they look equally lousy."
"Naughty girl! Such language!" Joseph said. "You young people don't appreciate Christmas as my generation did. Doesn't it mean anything to you?"
"It will, by the time we're through," replied Mathilda, once more ascending the steps.