Page:The Climber (Benson).djvu/83

Rh have told my head was so bad, dear, as I have made no complaint. Red eight; but I can't get at it."

There was a long silence, broken by an occasional sigh from Aunt Elizabeth. Then she spoke again.

"No doubt times are changed," she said,"but it is not so long ago when, if a young man, be he plain Mr. Smith or a Duke, came and had tea alone with a girl in a garden, we shouldn't have liked to express our opinion about it. So I express no opinion now. But I suppose I have a right as to my feelings on the subject, though I keep them to myself."

"Stuff!" said Aunt Catherine in a low voice, really not meaning Elizabeth to hear. But perhaps the shock to the aural nerve caused by the crash of the piano-lid had stimulated it, and she did hear.

"It may or may not be stuff," she said in almost a whisper, "though I am not aware to what stuff you allude, but I repeat that as long as I do not give vent to my feelings, they concern nobody but myself. And with regard to sending Lord Brayton a card, I am aware that you intend to do so, Catherine, if you have not already done so, and I merely wish to say that if people go about calling us pushing and forward, I will take my share of the scandal, as if it had been I who urged you to invite him. Whatever you do, Catherine, you may remember that you have got a sister who would never turn her back upon you. And the red eight comes down."

This tender assurance served only to exasperate Aunt Catherine. She had heard that sort of thing before, and knew what it meant, for it always portended some attack on Elizabeth's part.

"But we always send cards to all our calling-list," she said. "And as he has called, he is on our calling-list."

"Then if murderers and forgers left their cards, should we have the pleasure of seeing them on our Tuesdays?" asked Elizabeth.

"But Lord Brayton isn't a murderer or a forger," said Catherine.

Elizabeth gathered up the cards with a trembling hand, for it was clear that no further progress could be made.

"I cannot play my game if you insist on arguing with me," she said, "but it is not of the slightest importance, though the situation was interesting. Even if Lord Brayton is not a murderer or a forger, I do not know that he is the sort of young man whom our mother, Catherine, would have liked to have in the house. I am aware"—and Elizabeth put her handkerchief to her mouth, and