But oh! Uncle John was glad to see her! His picture of her, as she sat there, her cheeks flushed, in a rose-coloured dress, with the room as soft and delicate as a shell around her, filled him with delight: changes had come to him even since their last meeting. The lines in his forehead seemed to her a little deeper, his eyes were anxious and his smile less sure and genial. He wore a beautiful white waistcoat and sat there, with his chest out, his white hair rising into a crest, looking exactly like a pouter pigeon. "Dear Uncle John! I'm _so_ glad!" "Well, my dear, I was just passing. Been to some woman who's got a party in Harley House. War party, of course, there were characters of the names of different generals and if you won you paid a guinea to the War Fund--quite a reversal of the ordinary proceedings. I'm sure, my dear, I don't know why I went. Well, it was so close that I felt I couldn't walk back, even to 104, without a cup of tea from you. How's Roddy?" "All right. Lord Massiter's been down there chatting to him ever since three o'clock. Would you like us to go down and have our tea with _them_, or shall we stay cosily up here by ourselves?" "Why, stay up here of course! You're not looking very well, my dear. You've not been the thing lately, have you? This business with Roddy?..." (he took her hand and held it)--"Don't you think it would be a good thing if you went away for a week or two and had a change?" "No, Uncle John dear, thank you. I _am_ tired and I _will_ go away later on, but just now it would only make me anxious and I should worry about Roddy." Tea was brought. She looked at Uncle John and thought that he had heard nothing. His guileless eyes smiled back at her; all that she could discern in him was apprehension lest he should say something to displease her, to make her angry. Bless his heart, he need not be afraid of that now! As she gave him his sugar she felt that some of the old intimate relationship between them was creeping back. "Of course you heard of grandmother's wonderful visit to us the other day," Rachel said. "Wasn't it amazing? and Christopher says that she was none the worse--rather the better." "Amazing," said Uncle John very solemnly. "Perfectly astonishing. Your grandmother, Rachel, is an astounding woman. Just when we were all of us thinking that she was really not quite so well, quite so fit as she used to be, she comes along and does something that she hasn't done for thirty years. I confess I was nervous when I first heard of it, but Christopher reassured me--said it would do her no harm, and it hasn't." "It shows what her affection for Roddy is," Rachel said slowly. "And for you, dear," Uncle John said timidly. "I know that you haven't--well, haven't--that is, weren't always very friendly, but I hope that now you've come to understand her a little more. She's a difficult woman. She wouldn't be so splendid if she weren't so difficult."