She repreated the message, quietly, accurately, slowly.

Uncle Preston, who was not so intelligent as Auntie Loo, immediately flew into a muddle.

‘A cottage? What sort of a cottage? Where is it? Where’s the money coming from? What are they going to live on? I never heard such nonsense … ringing me up at eight o’clock at night and asking me to settle such a thing at a moment’s notice. Just like Hartley and Oliver – no prudence, no foresight. Is she still there? And how about the boys? Do they want to go and live there, too? It’s miles away, I suppose, in the country. How about their fares? Fares mount up …’

Auntie Loo waited for a lull, and sailed neatly in with – ‘What shall I say to Sophia, then, dear?’

‘Tell her that I am very displeased. Very displeased indeed. I must talk it over with Marriot, and then I must see the cottage, and then I must talk to Graby about Francis, and then we will see. I cannot be rushed into things in this way. I will not. Sophia is exactly like Hartley – he was always so eager, so headstrong …’

‘Perhaps, dear, you would like to talk to Sophia about it tomorrow, when you are less tired. Suppose I ask her to telephone us about lunch time? or say at half past twelve?’

‘Well … yes … possibly that would be best. I can say nothing until I have seen Marriot and talked it over with him. Nothing. But perhaps I can tell Sophia best myself tomorrow. Yes. Tell her, please, to telephone me tomorrow no later than half past twelve. And say that I am very much upset, very agitated—’ and indeed, he was beginning to breathe in short, distressing gasps, a sight which made Auntie Loo’s face lose its bright look.

After the message had been given, Sophia, chilled and impatient, said pleadingly – she so longed to talk to someone kind about the cottage – ‘Don’t you think it would be lovely, Auntie Loo, if we could?’

And Auntie Loo, even though she knew that Uncle Preston could hear every word from where he sat by the sitting room fire, replied clearly and firmly, ‘I think it’s a splendid idea, dear. Very good indeed; and I hope everything will turn out for the best, so that you can all live together for as long as you want to. That’s how brothers and sisters should be.’

‘Thanks awfully, Auntie Loo! You are kind!’ said a surprised, grateful young voice at the other end of the line, and having agreed to telephone her uncle at half past twelve the next morning, Sophia rang off.

Uncle Preston said no more about the cottage for two hours, much to Auntie Loo’s relief, for this was a good sign. Silence, accompanied by an intent perusal of the newspaper meant that Uncle Preston, instead of letting his nervous system take charge of his views about the cottage, was allowing his common sense to do so. Auntie Loo knitted a jumper in placid silence, broken by occasional dry little laughs at the jokes made by a comedian on the wireless. ‘Very comical; quite amusing,’ said Uncle Preston, at half past nine; but then they turned the wireless off because somebody was going to give a talk on ‘Mice’, and Auntie Loo did not want to hear anything about them, nasty dirty little things.