‘It is a thing that only unusual people talk sensibly about,’ said Hatton.
‘Honor is unusual,’ said Gavin. ‘Father said she was.’
‘Well, she wants other people to think so too,’ said Mullet.
‘I don’t care if they don’t,’ said Honor; ‘I don’t want them to think the same.’
‘James doesn’t mind if Mother marries Mr Ridley,’ said Gavin. ‘I don’t mind either, if they like to do it.’
‘That is a good reason,’ said Hatton.
‘He doesn’t mind,’ said Nevill. ‘He is the same as James.’
‘I know why Mother wants to marry him; said Honor. ‘I always understand things. It is because she hadn’t anyone to think so much of her as Father did, when she had got used to it. But I shouldn’t ever marry a second person, when the first one had done that.’
‘I daresay the people won’t ask you,’ said Gavin. ‘You are not allowed to ask them yourself.’
‘He will marry her,’ said Nevill, nodding at Honor.
‘You won’t be allowed to,’ said Gavin. ‘You are her brother.’
‘He isn’t allowed either,’ said Nevill, pointing at Gavin.
‘Now none of this talk downstairs,’ said Hatton. ‘Don’t say a word about it, unless other people do.’
Her injunction was heeded by one of her hearers, who ran up to Regan as he entered the room.
‘He won’t talk about it,’ he promised.
‘What is the forbidden subject?’ she said.
Nevill looked at her, as if he would explain, if he had the words.
‘Mother and Mr Ridley marrying,’ said Gavin, in a ruthless tone.
‘A nurse’s idea,’ said Sir Jesse. ‘We may have our own.’
‘I have not avoided the subject today,’ said Eleanor.
‘Least said, soonest mended,’ said Honor.
‘There is nothing that requires mending,’ said her mother.
‘Nevill reminds me of James at that age,’ said Luce, as if she had not heard what had passed. ‘He has no touch of Gavin.’
‘Not him and Gavin,’ said Nevill. ‘Him and James.’
‘None of you seems like another to me,’ said Eleanor. ‘Perhaps Daniel and Gavin are a little alike.’
‘And Isabel and Honor, Mother,’ said Luce.
‘Well, not so much alike, as with a good deal in common.’
‘Soundly observed in a way, Mother, but Father used to say they were alike,’ said Luce, her tone setting the example of continued easy reference to her father.
‘Have you settled on a house, Eleanor?’ said Regan. ‘I suppose you have made a search for one.’
‘We have done everything but sign the lease. I think we cannot do better.’
‘It is a nice house,’ said Nevill.
‘What do you know about it?’ said Gavin.
‘Mother will live there with Mr Ridley.’
‘What house is it?’ said Honor.
‘The square house near the church,’ said her mother. ‘It is called the Grey House.’
‘Isn’t it very small?’
‘Not for the two of us. It has six bedrooms. This house has given you a wrong standard. I have always foreseen that you will have to modify your ideas.’
‘It is a sort of grey,’ said Gavin.
‘No, not grey,’ said Nevill.
‘It has a green lawn,’ said Luce.
‘Where is the lawn?’ said Gavin.
‘In front of the house,’ said his mother.
‘I don’t call that a lawn.’
‘What do you call it?’
‘A patch of grass.’
‘You will all have to live in a castle.’
‘A great, big castle,’ said Nevill. ‘He will live in one with soldiers in it. It is called a fort.’
‘I must get you some toy cottages,’ said Eleanor. ‘I saw some in London.’
‘When will you get them?’ said Gavin, coming nearer.
‘Ridley will bring them. They will be a present from us both. Perhaps he will bring them tomorrow.’
‘No, today,’ said Nevill, with rising feeling. ‘Today.’
‘Tomorrow will soon be here,’ said Luce.
‘It won’t,’ said Nevill, in a tone of experience.
‘Is there anything joined to the cottages?’ said Gavin.
‘There is a little garden with a patch of grass,’ said Eleanor, with a smile.
‘A cottage with a hen,’ said Nevill.
‘Miss Pilbeam might help us to make a pigsty,’ said Honor.
‘The ideas for future establishments are suitably modified,’ said Daniel.
‘Mother dear, your scheme is crowned with success,’ said Luce.
‘We shouldn’t want to live in the cottages,’ said Gavin.
‘He will live in a cottage,’ said Nevill. ‘With Hatton.’
‘What would you have to eat?’ said Daniel.
‘A hen would lay an egg,’ said Nevill, without hesitation.
‘Who would eat the egg? You or Hatton?’
‘One for Hatton and one for him.’
‘But would one hen lay two eggs?’
‘One, two, three, four, five, six, fourteen.’
‘But you would be sick, if you ate so many.’
‘Give them all to Hatton,’ said Nevill, in a tone of suitably and generously solving the problem.
‘Now you three can go upstairs,’ said Eleanor. ‘No one else can speak while you are here. Now, James, let us hear your voice.’
‘Will you often be at luncheon after you are married?’ said James, recalled by his predicament to the time when it might be less frequent.
‘I shall be there when Grandma asks me. Now see if you can open your mouth without asking a question.’
‘There is a monkey-puzzle tree in front of your house. On the piece of grass, on the lawn.’
‘Do you think you will ever have a house of your own?’ said Eleanor.
‘Yes. Everyone is paid enough for that. Even a labourer has a cottage. And if he can’t earn, he can go to the workhouse.’
‘Constant stimulus has not been in vain,’ said Daniel. ‘Witness the gulf between James’s ideas and those of the other.’
‘With the children reconciled to cottages, and James to the workhouse,’ said Graham, looking at the window, ‘Mother need not be distressed about the notions of her family.’
‘But it would be sad to be brought to the workhouse,’ said Eleanor to James, fearing she had made such a prospect too natural.
‘It is better than it was, more comfortable.’
‘James has carried his concern to the point of investigation,’ said Daniel. ‘He can pass on to Graham anything that Graham needs to know. So all Mother’s sons are provided for.’
‘You will step into my shoes yourself?’ said Sir Jesse.
There was silence.
‘With their father in his grave, it is no wonder if it seems the natural place for his parents,’ said Regan.
‘There is no problem about our final accommodation,’ said Graham. ‘We have no anxiety there.’
‘People in the workhouse can have a pauper’s funeral,’ said James.
‘I think that is enough about the workhouse,’ said Eleanor.
‘What can a man do to earn the most?’ said James, as if going as far as possible from the subject.
‘We have reached that estate, and do not know,’ said Daniel.
‘Has Grandpa earned a great deal?’
‘He has never needed to earn,’ said Isabel. ‘Things will be different for you.’
‘Did Father earn very much?’
‘Heredity seems to justify James in his perplexity,’ said Daniel. ‘And it throws no light for any of us.’
‘The first thing to do is to work and get to Cambridge,’ said Eleanor.
‘But Daniel and Graham are there, and they don’t know about earning. And that is the only thing that matters, isn’t it?’
Eleanor was silent before this result of her admonitions.
‘You have to be an educated man before you can do anything.’