"If you knew Dr. Martineau--"
"You've no business to know him," Emilius said, "when your brother Victor
and I disapprove of him."
Emilius was carving chicken. He had an air of kindly, luscious
hospitality, hesitating between the two flawless breasts.
"Dr. Martineau is the wisest and holiest man I ever knew," said Aunt
Lavvy.
"I daresay your sister Charlotte thinks Mr. Marriott the wisest and the
holiest man _she_ ever knew."
He settled the larger breast on Aunt Lavvy's plate and laid on it one
perfect star of beetroot. He could do that while he insulted her.
"Oh--Papa--you _are_ a br--"
Aunt Lavvy shook her gentle head.
"Lavinia dear" (Mamma's voice was gentle), "did you have a nice service?"
"Very nice, thank you."
"Did you go to Saint Mary's, or the Parish church?"
Aunt Lavvy's straight, flat chin trembled slightly. Her pale eyes
lightened. "I went to neither."
"Then---where did you go?"
"If you insist on knowing, Caroline, I went to Mr. Robson's church."
"You went to Mr.--to the Unitarian Chapel?"
"To the Unitarian Chapel."
"Emilius--" You would have thought that Aunt Lavvy had hit Mamma and hurt
her.
Emilius took up his table napkin and wiped his moustache carefully. He
was quite horribly calm.
"You will oblige me by not going there again," he said.
"You forget that I went every Sunday when we were in Liverpool."
"You forget that is the reason why you left Liverpool."
"Only one of the reasons, I think."
"Can you tell me what reason you have for going now? Beyond your desire
to make yourself different from other people."
"Aren't Unitarians other people?"
She poured out a glass of water and drank. She was giving herself time.
"My reason," she said, "is that I have joined the Unitarian Church."
Mamma put down her knife and fork. Her lips opened and her face turned
suddenly sharp and sallow as if she were going to faint.
"You don't mean to say you've gone over? Then God help poor Charlotte!"
Emilius steadied himself to speak. "Does Victor know?" he said.
"Yes. He knows."
"You have consulted him, and you have not consulted me?"
"You made me promise not to talk about it. I have kept my promise."
Mary was sure then that Aunt Lavvy had left the book open on purpose. She
had laid a trap for Emilius, and he had fallen into it.
"If you will hold infamous opinions you must be made to keep them to
yourself."
"I have a perfect right to my opinions."
"You have no right to make an open profession of them."
"The law is more tolerant than you, Emilius."
"There is a moral law and a law of honour. You are not living by
yourself. As long as you are in Victor's house the least you can do is to
avoid giving offence. Have you no consideration for your family? You say
you came here to be near us. Have you thought of us? Have you thought of
the children? Do you expect Caroline to go to Victor's house if she's to
meet the Unitarian minister and his wife?"
"You will be cutting yourself off completely, Lavinia," Mamma said.
"From what?"
"From everybody. People don't call on Nonconformists. If there were no
higher grounds--"
"Oh--Caroline--" Aunt Lavvy breathed it on a long sigh.
"It's all very well for you. But you might think of your sister
Charlotte," Mamma said.
Papa's beard jerked. He drew in his breath with a savage guttural noise.
"A-ach! What's the good of talking?"
He had gone on eating all the time. There was a great pile of chicken
bones on his plate.
Aunt Lavvy turned. "Emilius--for thirty-three years"--her voice broke as
she quivered under her loaded anguish--"for thirty-three years you've
shouted me down. You haven't let me call my soul my own. Yet it _is_ my
own--"
"There, please--_please_," Mamma said, "don't let us have any more of
it," just as Aunt Lavvy was beginning to get a word in edgeways.
"Mamma, that isn't fair, you must let her speak."
"Yes. You must let me speak." Aunt Lavvy's voice thickened in her throat.
"I won't have any discussion of Unitarianism here," said Papa.
"It's you who have been discussing it, not I."
"It is, really, Papa. First you began. Then Mamma."