‘Yours is only faintly aquiline, darling.’
‘I was terrified of its gettin’ worse, as a child. I used to stand with the tip pressed up against a wardrobe.’
‘I’ve tried that too, Auntie, only the other way.’
‘Once while I was doin’ it your father was lyin’ concealed on the top, like a leopard, you know, and he hopped over me and bit through his lip. He bled all down my neck.’
‘How nasty!’
‘Yes. Lawrence, what are you thinking about?’
‘I was thinking that Dinny has probably had no lunch. Have you, Dinny?’
‘I was going to have it tomorrow, Uncle.’
‘There you are!’ said Lady Mont. ‘Ring for Blore. You’ll never have enough body until you’re married.’
‘Let’s get Clare over first, Aunt Em.’
‘St George’s. I suppose Hilary’s doin’ them?’
‘Of course!’
‘I shall cry.’
‘Why, exactly, do you cry at weddings, Auntie?’
‘She’ll look like an angel; and the man’ll be in black tails and a toothbrush moustache, and not feelin’ what she thinks he is. Saddenin’!’
‘But perhaps he’s feeling more. I’m sure Michael was about Fleur, or Uncle Adrian when he married Diana.’
‘Adrian’s fifty-three and he’s got a beard. Besides, he’s Adrian.’
‘I admit that makes a difference. But I think we ought rather to cry over the man. The woman’s having the hour of her life and the man’s waistcoat is almost certain to be too tight.’
‘Lawrence’s wasn’t. He was always a thread-paper, and I was as slim as you, Dinny.’
‘You must have looked lovely in a veil, Aunt Em. Didn’t she, Uncle?’ The whimsically wistful look on both those mature faces stopped her, and she added: ‘Where did you first meet?’
‘Out huntin’, Dinny. I was in a ditch, and your uncle didn’t like it, he came and pulled me out.’
‘I think that’s ideal.’
‘Too much mud. We didn’t speak to each other all the rest of the day.’
‘Then what brought you together?’
‘One thing and another. I was stayin’ with Hen’s people, the Corderoys, and your uncle called to see some puppies. What are you catechisin’ me for?’
‘I only just wanted to know how it was done in those days.’
‘Go and find out for yourself how it’s done in these days.’
‘Uncle Lawrence doesn’t want to get rid of me.’
‘All men are selfish, except Michael and Adrian.’
‘Besides, I should hate to make you cry.’
‘Blore, a cocktail and a sandwich for Miss Dinny, she’s had no lunch. And, Blore, Mr and Mrs Adrian and Mr and Mrs Michael to dinner. And, Blore, tell Laura to put one of my nightdresses and the other things in the blue spare room. Miss Dinny’ll stay the night. Those children!’ And, swaying slightly, Lady Mont preceded her butler through the doorway.
‘What a darling, Uncle!’
‘I’ve never denied it, Dinny.’
‘I always feel better after her. Was she ever out of temper?’
‘She can begin to be, but she always goes on to something else before she’s finished.’
‘What saving grace…!’
At dinner that evening, Dinny listened for any allusion by her uncle to Wilfred Desert’s return. There was none.
After dinner, she seated herself by Fleur in her habitual, slightly mystified admiration of this cousin by marriage, whose pretty poise was so assured, whose face and figure so beautifully turned out, whose clear eyes were so seeing, whose knowledge of self was so disillusioned, and whose attitude to Michael seemed at once that of one looking up and looking down.
‘If I ever married,’ thought Dinny, ‘I could never be like that to him. I would have to look him straight in the face as one sinner to another.’
‘Do you remember your wedding, Fleur?’ she said.
‘I do, my dear. A distressing ceremony!’
‘I saw your best man today.’
The clear white round Fleur’s eyes widened.
‘Wilfrid? How did you remember him?’
‘I was only sixteen, and he fluttered my young nerves.’
‘That is, of course, the function of a best man. Well, and how was he?’
‘Very dark and dissolvent.’
Fleur laughed. ‘He always was.’
Looking at her, Dinny decided to press on.
‘Yes. Uncle Lawrence told me he tried to carry dissolution rather far.’
Fleur looked surprised. ‘I didn’t know Bart ever noticed that.’
‘Uncle Lawrence,’ said Dinny, ‘is a bit uncanny.’