Edward and Mother Give a Tea Party ‘Well, Mother, who do you think will be the first to arrive?’ said Edward Killigrew, pacing eagerly about the drawing-room. ‘I think it will be Miss Doggett.’ ‘Did you remember to bring the cakes from Boffin’s, dear?’ asked his mother. ‘Oh, Mother, you know I did,’ said Edward, a little impatiently. ‘You can’t ask people to tea and give them nothing to eat.’ ‘No,’ said Mrs. Killigrew sardonically, ‘even one’s friends expect more than that. But this afternoon we shall have interesting news for them as well as cakes. That is good.’ She took a little mirror out of her reticule. She was a fine-looking old woman of nearly eighty, very proud of her thick white hair and still good complexion. She was reputed to be of German origin and a slightly guttural quality in her speech sometimes betrayed this, although nobody knew for certain where she had come from. She had somehow always been in Oxford, first as a domineering wife and mother and then as a mother only.
