he mistress of Broadwood understand that she
and the girls now regarded their occupancy of that estate as absolutely
over. He had already, several weeks before, picked a little at the arid
tract of that indicated surrender, but in the interval the soil appeared
to have formed again to a considerable thickness. It was disagreeable to
him to call his parent's attention to the becoming course, and
especially disagreeable to have to emphasise it and discuss it and
perhaps clamour for it. He would have liked the whole business to be
tacit--a little triumph of silent delicacy. But he found reasons to
suspect that what in fact would be most tacit was Julia's certain
endurance of any chance failure of that charm. Lady Agnes had a theory
that they had virtually--"practically" as she said--given up the place,
so that there was no need of making a splash about it; but Nick
discovered in the course of an exploration of Biddy's view more rigorous
perhaps than any to which he had ever subjected her, that none of their
property had been removed from the delightful house--none of the things
(there were ever so many things) heavily planted there when their mother
took possession. Lady Agnes was the proprietor of innumerable articles
of furniture, relics and survivals of her former greatness, and moved
about the world with a train of heterogeneous baggage; so that her quiet
overflow into the spaciousness of Broadwood had had all the luxury of a
final subsidence. What Nick had to propose to her now was a dreadful
combination, a relapse into the conditions she most hated--seaside
lodgings, bald storehouses in the Marylebone Road, little London rooms
crammed with objects that caught the dirt and made them stuffy. He was
afraid he should really finish her, and he himself was surprised in a
degree at his insistence. He wouldn't have supposed he should have cared
so much, but he found he did care intensely. He cared enough--it says
everything--to explain to his mother that her retention of Broadwood
would show "practically" (since that was her great word) for the
violation of an agreement. Julia had given them the place on the
understanding that he was to marry her, and once he was definitely not
to marry her they had no right to keep the place. "Yes, you make the
mess and _we_ pay the penalty!" the poor lady flashed out; but this was
the only overt protest she made--except indeed to contend that their
withdrawal would be an act ungracious and o