Miss Field raised her eyebrows.
"Are you going then to let him come here alone? She'll be always asking
you! Oh, you needn't be afraid--" and this most candid of cousins
laughed aloud. "Rachel isn't a flirt--except of the intellectual kind.
But she takes possession--she sticks like a limpet."
There was a pause. Then Miss Field added:
"You mustn't think it odd that I say these things about Rachel. I have
to explain her to people. She's not like anybody else."
Doris did not quite see the necessity, but she kept the reflection to
herself, and Miss Field passed lightly to the other guests--Sir Luke, a
tame cat of the house, who quarrelled with Lady Dunstable once a month,
vowed he would never come near her again, and always reappeared; the
Dean, who in return for a general submission, was allowed to scold her
occasionally for her soul's health; the politicians whom she could not
do without, who were therefore handled more gingerly than the rest; the
military and naval men who loved Dunstable and put up with his wife for
his sake; and the young people--nephews and nieces and cousins--who
liked an unconventional hostess without any foolish notions of
chaperonage, and always enjoyed themselves famously at Crosby Ledgers.
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