ing. I notice it. This climate don't agree with her. It takes an old war-horse like me to stand it. I've lived through India and I've lived through Canada. Roasting and freezing. All one to me."
Augusta looked down her nose. She was greatly chagrined by the old lady's remarks. She said: "It is no great wonder if I am unwell. It has been a trying time." She directed her offended gaze toward Renny.
He did not see it. His eyes were fixed on his grandmother. He was absorbing her aspect, delighting in her. Some perversity of his nature had impelled him to write to her, asking her to oversee the furnishing of the Hut for Eden and Alayne—she was the one above all who would see to it that the Hut was made comfortable. This he wrote, knowing that she was capable only of making things difficult for his aunt. His feeling toward Augusta was not altogether dutiful, though, on occasion, he would be demonstratively affectionate. She too often interfered with the boys. She too often sounded the note of England's superiority, of the crudity of the Colonies. He admired her, but he resented her. He admired his grandmother and resented not her most flagrant absurdities. Now her air of hilarity, of the exaltation of a superior being, moved him to tenderness toward her. He forgot for the moment his anxiety over Eden. He forgot his smouldering passion for Alayne. He was satisfied to see her sitting at his grandmother's right hand, for a while, at least, a member of his tribe. He felt the tug of those unseen cords between himself and every being in the room.
Eden's exhaustion after the journey was, for the moment, forgotten in the excitement of the home-coming. He felt the cynical bliss of the prodigal. He was at his own hearth again, he was loved, but he knew he was unchanged. He smiled mockingly at Alayne across the purple velvet expanse of Grandmother's lap, across the glitter of her rings as they pressed into the flesh of the two captured hands. He felt an exquisite relief in the knowledge that Alayne would be with him at Jalna, to care for him as she had done once before when he was ill.
