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Chapter Five
Seeking Sympathy

The Carters were a numerous family. They lived about a mile away from the Aldworths. The Aldworths lived in a small house in the town and the Carters in a large country place with spacious grounds and every imaginable luxury. Mr Carter had suddenly made a great pile of money in iron, had retired to private life, and had given his six children everything that money could buy. The Carters conducted themselves always according to their special will; they had no mother to look after them, their mother having died when Penelope, the youngest girl, was a baby. There were two sons in the family and four daughters. The sons were called Jim and Harry, the girls were Clara, Mabel, Annie, and Penelope. They were ordinary, good-natured, good-humoured sort of girls; they took life easily. Clara, the eldest, believed herself to be the mistress of the house, and a very sorry mistress she would have made but for the fact that there was an invaluable old nurse, a servant, who had lived with Mrs Carter before she died, and who really held the household reins. This kind-hearted, motherly body kept the young people in check, although she never appeared to cross them. They consulted her without knowing that they did so. She superintended the servants; she saw to the linen press; she arranged the food; she kept all the supplies with a liberal hand, and gave Clara and the other girls carte blanche with regard to what they might do with their time, and when they might entertain their friends.

The old house, Court Prospect by name, on account of its extensive view, was very suitable for entertainments. Once it had been the property of a gracious and noble family; but hard times had come upon them and Sir John St. Just had been glad to receive the money which the rich Mr Carter was prepared to offer. In consequence, the St. Justs had disappeared from the neighbourhood. Beautiful Angela St. Just no longer delighted the people when she walked down the aisle of the little village church. She no longer sang with a voice which seemed to the parishioners like that of an angel, in the choir. She went away with her father, and the Carters, it must be owned, had a bad time of it during the first year of their residence at Court Prospect.

But money can effect wonders. The place was according to the Carters’ ideas completely renovated. The hideous, ugly out-of-date furniture was replaced by maple with plush and gilt and modern taste. The gardens were laid out according to the ideas of a landscape gardener who had certainly never consulted the true ideas of Nature. Some of the old timber had been cut down to enlarge the view, as Clara expressed it.

This young lady was now exactly eighteen years of age. She was out, and so was her twin sister, Mabel. Annie, who was only seventeen, was still supposed to be in the school-room, but she was very much en évidence at all the parties and entertainments; but Penelope, who was only fourteen, was obliged to be to a certain extent under tutelage.

The Carters’ ball, or rather, as they expressed it themselves, their little impromptu dance, had been the talk of all the girls and young men who were lucky enough to be invited to it. It was a great honour to be intimate with the Carters; they were jolly, good-natured girls, and certainly without a trace of snobbishness in their compositions. They were so rich that they did not want to be bothered, as they expressed it, with monied people; they liked to choose their own friends. Molly and Ethel and Nesta had attracted Clara and Mabel some time ago, and their brothers, too, had considered the girls very pretty; for the young Aldworths were of the laughing, joking, gay sort of girls, who could talk in a pert, frank fashion; who were not troubled with an overplus of brains, and, in consequence, were exceedingly popular with certain individuals.

It was to visit the Carters, therefore, and to unburden her mind of its load, that Ethel, with her aching head, proceeded to go on this hot summer afternoon. She found the girls and two boy friends from the neighbourhood having tea under the wide-spreading cedar tree on the lawn. This cedar tree had been the pride of Sir John St. Just, but Mr Carter seriously thought of cutting it down in order to still further enlarge the view; therefore the poor old cedar was at present on sufferance, and the young people were enjoying its shade when Ethel appeared with crimson cheeks, and eyes which still bore traces of the heavy tears which she had shed. They jumped up, and Mabel ran to meet her.

“This is good; and so you have followed your horrid, detestable note. Why, of course, you are coming to-night. Clara and I won’t hear of a refusal.”

“We cannot, really,” said Ethel. “We can’t either of us come.”

“Let me introduce you to Mr John and Mr Henry Grace,” said Mabel, bringing Ethel up to the rest of the party.

“Have some tea, Ethel, do,” said Clara, holding out her hand a little languidly. “How awfully hot you look.”

Ethel sank down on a chair which one of the others had vacated and allowed herself to be cooled and petted. Clara suddenly began on the subject of the ball.

“What a queer note you sent; what does it all mean?” she asked.

“I will tell you afterwards; I have come over to explain,” said Ethel, “if I can see you – you and dear Mabel for a few minutes alone before I leave.”

“Dear me, what is the mystery?” said Jim, who had flung himself on the grass. “Why can’t you tell us all? It would be no end of a lark. Another rumpus with the mother. Is she more cantankerous than ever?”

“No, mother is quite nice, particularly nice,” said Ethel, who had often explained to the young Carters what a trial her mother was.

“Well, then, come and have a game,” said Jim. “Come along, do, and forget all the worries. If it isn’t the mother it can’t be anything very serious.”

“Yes, but it is, and I cannot tell you,” said Ethel.

She looked so forlorn that everyone present pitied her. Her soft brown eyes filled with sudden tears and overflowed.

“Oh, how my head is aching. I’ve been lying down all the afternoon. I just managed to come out to tell you, for I felt you must know.”

“Is it as bad as that? Then we had best make ourselves scarce,” said Jim. “Come along, let us go away, we who are the unfavoured; we’ll leave the select few to listen to confidences.”

A game of tennis was presently in active progress, Clara and Mabel, who both longed to join, did not feel too sympathetic.

“Well,” said Clara, “whatever is it? Do tell all. If you won’t come to-night and you won’t play, why – ”

“Oh, you mean me to go,” said Ethel. “It’s always like that – I might have expected it.”

“Oh, no; don’t go,” said Mabel, who was more good-natured than her sister, “that is,” she corrected herself, “if we can do anything to help you.”

“I must tell you – I won’t keep you more than a few minutes. You know Marcia – you have heard of her?”

“Of your elder sister? Oh, how funny! There came a letter yesterday from Colonel St. Just to father, and he said that his sister, Mrs Silchester, is coming to spend the holidays with them, and that she had mentioned your sister, Miss Marcia Aldworth. She said what a splendid girl she was. Colonel St. Just told us to tell you – he thought you would be pleased.”

“Oh, she is deceived in her,” said Ethel, her face getting redder than ever. “She is deceived in her. I wish she knew. Well, I’ll tell you all about it. You know Marcia isn’t our real sister – ”

“Oh, my dear, of course, that is no news,” said Clara more crossly than ever.

“But she is older – she is older than I am, and older than Molly. She is twenty.”

This was said with effect, and a long pause followed. “She will be twenty-one before long. You can’t call that young, can you?”

“Well, not as young as eighteen, of course.”

“But it isn’t young at all,” said Ethel, in a fretful tone. “Now I am only seventeen, and dear Molly is only eighteen; we are quite young.”

“And so are we, we are both eighteen, aren’t we, darling old Clay?” said Mabel, patting her sister on the face.

“Yes, but don’t call me Clay – it does sound so earthy,” said Clara. “But do go on, Ethel. Out with this trouble.”

“Well, it is this – father sent for Marcia.”

“What, from that delightful school where Mrs Silchester adores her so much?”

“Yes, why not? She is his child, and he sent for her, and she came, and Horace approved of the plan.”

“I am always so frightened of that Horace of yours,” said Mabel. “But do hurry up.”

“Well, she came. We feared she wouldn’t, for she is awfully selfish; but she did; she came, and we were so happy. It was, you know, liberation for us, for dear mother, poor darling, does take up such a lot of time. One of us has always to be with her, and sometimes two have to be with her, for father insists on her never being alone, and we are not rich like you, and cannot afford a hired nurse.”

“And who would give a hired nurse to one’s mother?” said Mabel.

“Well, anyhow, that is how it is; we wouldn’t, of course, and Marcia came. She came last night. She is very staid, you know, not a bit like us.”

One of the boys shouted across to ask Clara when she would be finished and ready to make up a set.

“I really cannot stay,” said Clara. “Oh, you aren’t a bit sympathising. I thought you would be; but I don’t suppose any one will be. Well, she came, and she absolutely refused to give more than a little bit of her time to mother. We’re to be tied as much as usual, and we cannot come to-night. You know Molly and I never do anything apart, and Molly won’t be free, for mother is never settled till between nine and ten o’clock, and it would be much, much too late. We’ll never be able to go anywhere. Marcia will manage that we’re to be tied and bound as much as ever we were, and Marcia will have all the honour and glory. Oh dear, we can only be young once. I think Marcia might have remembered that – Marcia, whose youth is quite over. I do think she might – I do!”

“Poor Ethel,” said Clara, with more sympathy. “It does seem hard. Well, we’ll try and get some fun for you on your free days. After all she is your mother. Coming, Jim, coming. Sorry you can’t be here to-night, Ethel; but we’ll get up some fun again in a hurry. Now, cheer up, old girl, cheer up.”

Chapter Six
The Joy of her Life

The next morning passed somehow. The girls had decided that they would send Marcia to Coventry. They had made up their minds in a solemn conclave late the night before.

“We daren’t oppose her for the present,” said Ethel, who had thought of this daring plan, “but we’ll make her life so miserable that she just won’t be able to bear it.”

“She used to be so affectionate; I remember that,” said Molly. “She was very good to me when I had the measles. She used to sit in the room and never think of herself at all.”

“She caught them afterwards, don’t you remember, horrid things?” said Nesta.

“And I don’t think I went to sit with her at all,” said Molly.

“It was rather piggish of you, wasn’t it?” said Ethel.

“Well, well; don’t rake up my old faults now. Am I not sad enough? Do you really think, Nesta and Ethel, that we had best send her to Coventry? Do you mean really to Coventry?”

“Yes; don’t let’s speak to her. We’ll try the effect for a week. We’ll do our duty, of course. We’ll go into mother’s room in turn, and we’ll give up everything for our mother’s sake, and we’ll deny ourselves, and we’ll never speak to Marcia at all. When we are at meals, if she forces us to speak, we’ll say yes and no, but that’s all, unless Horace or father is present. We’ll leave her quite to herself; she shall have her free hours, and her time for writing, and we wish her joy of it.”

This plan of action being determined on, the girls went to bed with a certain sense of consolation.

It was Ethel’s turn to spend the morning with the invalid on the following day, and she determinedly went there without a word. The effect of the Coventry system seemed at first to be but small. During breakfast that morning Marcia was absorbed in some letters she had received. She asked her father the best way to get to Hurst Castle.

“Why do you want to go there?” asked her parent.

“I have had a letter from Angela St. Just. She is most anxious to see me.”

Ethel very nearly dropped the cup of tea which she was raising to her lips.

“Angela St. Just?” she murmured under her breath. Even Mr Aldworth looked interested.

“Do you know her?” he asked.

“Of course I do; she was one of Mrs Silchester’s pupils. She wants me to go and see her, and, if I can be spared, to spend a little time there in the summer. I have had a long letter from her.”

“She was a remarkably handsome girl; I remember that,” said Mr Aldworth. “Well, to be sure, and so she was at that school.”

“You forget, father,” said Marcia, “that Mrs Silchester is Sir Edward St. Just’s sister-in-law.”

“Indeed? That is news.”

Horace made one or two remarks.

“I am glad you know her so well, Marcia, and I hope you will have a pleasant time when you go to Hurst Castle. You say Sir Edward is staying there at present?”

“Yes, with some relatives.”

“And Angela?”

“Yes, they’re going to spend some months there this summer.”

Marcia then calmly read her remaining letters and then, just nodding towards Ethel, she said:

“I think it is your turn to look after mother, dear,” and she left the room.

But just as she reached the door she came back.

“Be very careful, dear Ethel, not to allow her to sit in the sun. It is such a beautiful day that I think you might wheel her on to the balcony, where she can get some fresh air. Just do your best to make her happy. I shall be so pleased if I see her looking bright and comfortable this afternoon.”

To these remarks Ethel proudly withheld any comment Marcia, not in the least disturbed, hurried away.

“Well,” said Nesta, when her father and brother and elder sister had made themselves scarce, “she doesn’t seem to be much put out by the beginning of Coventry; does she, Molly?”

“She’s so eaten up with pride,” said Molly, “talking about her Angela St. Just and her Hurst Castle – snobbish, I call it, don’t you, Ethel?”

“I don’t know that I shouldn’t like a little bit of it myself,” replied Ethel. “You should hear how the people talk of her in the town. They don’t think anything at all of the Carters, I can tell you.”

“You have never explained what happened during your visit yesterday,” said Molly.

Marcia was passing the window. She looked in.

“It’s time you went to mother, Ethel,” she said.

Ethel rose with a crimson face.

“Hateful old prig!” she said.

“There, girls, I can’t tell you now. I’m in for a jolly time, and you’ll be amusing yourselves in the garden, and she’ll amuse herself.”

“Well, you can think of me to-morrow,” said Nesta, “giving up my walk with Florrie Griffiths. That’s what I call hard, and you and Ethel will have a jolly afternoon all to yourselves, and a jolly morning to-morrow. It’s I who am to be pitied. I don’t think I can stand it. I think I’ll run away.”

“Don’t be a goose, Netty. You know you’ll have to bear the burden as well as Miss Mule Selfish.”

“Oh, what a funny name,” said Nesta, laughing.

“Do let us call her Mule Selfish. It does sound so funny.”

Ethel, having propounded this remarkable specimen of wit, went upstairs, considerably satisfied with herself. Her post that morning was no sinecure. Mrs Aldworth was in a terrible temper, and she was really weak and ill, too. It was one of her worst days. Ethel, always clumsy, was more so than usual. The sun poured in through the open window, and when the doctor arrived he was not pleased with the appearance of the room, and told Ethel so sharply.

“You are a very bad nurse,” he said, “for all the training you’ve had. Now don’t allow that blind to be in such a condition a moment longer. Get one of the servants to come and mend it. I am exceedingly annoyed to see your mother in such an uncomfortable condition.”

Ethel was forced to go off in search of a servant. The blind was mended after a fashion; the invalid was pitied by the doctor, who ordered a fresh tonic for her. So the weary hours flew by, and at last Ethel’s task was over. She rushed downstairs. The load was lifted from her mind; she was free for a bit. She immediately asked Molly how they might spend the afternoon.

Lunch was on the table and Marcia appeared. Marcia spoke to the young lady.

“How is mother?”

“I don’t know,” said Ethel.

“You don’t know? But you have been with her all the morning.”

“The doctor called; you had better ask him.”

“She will turn at that. I would like to catch her in a rage,” thought Ethel.

Marcia did not turn. She guessed what was passing through her young sister’s mind. It would pass presently. They would take the discipline she was bringing them through presently. She was sorry for them; she loved them very dearly; but give them an indulgent life to the detriment of their characters, and to her own misery, she would not.

By-and-by lunch came to an end, and then Marcia rose.

“Now, you go to your imprisonment,” thought Molly.

Marcia went into the garden. She gathered some flowers, then went into the fruit garden and picked some very fine gooseberries. She laid them in a little basket with some leaves over them, and with the fruit and flowers in her hand, and a pretty basket containing all kinds of fancy work, she went up to the sick-room.

Mrs Aldworth could not but smile when she saw the calm face, the pretty white dress, the elegant young figure. Of course, she must scold this recalcitrant step-daughter, but it was nice to see her, and the flowers smelt so sweet, and she had just been pining for some gooseberries. Why hadn’t one of her own girls thought of it?

Marcia spent nearly an hour putting the room in order. The Venetian blind did not work; the servant had mended it badly. She soon put that straight. She then sat down opposite to Mrs Aldworth.

“Our afternoons will be our pleasantest times,” she said. “There is so much to be done in the mornings, but in the afternoons we can have long talks, and I can amuse you with some of the school-life stories. I have something quite interesting to tell you to-day, and I have brought up a book which I should like to read to you, that is, if you are inclined to listen. And, oh, mother, I think you would like this new sort of fancy work. I have got all the materials for it. It would make some charming ornamental work for the drawing room. We ought to make the drawing room pretty by the time you come back to it.”

“Oh, but I shall never come back to it,” said Mrs Aldworth.

“Indeed you will, and very soon too. I’m not going to allow you to be long in this bedroom. You will be downstairs again in a few days.”

“Never,” said Mrs Aldworth.

“Indeed you will. And anyhow we ought to have the drawing room pretty now that Molly and Ethel are out – or consider themselves so. And, mother, dear,” – Marcia’s voice assumed a new and serious tone – “I have so much to talk to you about the dear girls.”

Mrs Aldworth trembled. Now, indeed, was the moment when she ought to begin, but somehow, try as she would, she found it impossible to be cross with Marcia. Still, the memory of Molly and her wrongs, of Nesta, and the burden she was unexpectedly forced to carry, of Ethel, and her tendency to sunstroke, came over her.

“Before you say anything, I must be frank,” she said.

“Oh, yes, mother; that’s what I should like, and expect,” said Marcia, not losing any of her cheerfulness, but laying down her work and preparing herself to listen.

She did not stare as her young sisters would have done, for she knew that Mrs Aldworth hated being stared at. She only glanced now and then, and her look was full of sympathy, and there was not a trace of anger on her face.

“You really are very nice, Marcia; there’s no denying it. I do wish that in some ways – not perhaps in looks, but in some ways, that my girls were more like you. But, dear, this is it – are you not a little hard on them? They’re so young.”

“So young?” said Marcia. “Molly is eighteen. She is only two years younger than I am.”

“But you will be twenty-one in three months’ time.”

“I think, mother, if you compare birthdays, you will find that Molly will be nineteen in four months’ time. There is little more than two years between us.”

Mrs Aldworth was always irritated when opposed.

“That’s true,” she said. “But don’t quibble, Marcia; that is a very disagreeable trait in any girl, particularly when she is addressing a woman so much older than herself. The girls are younger than you, not only in years but in character.”

“That I quite corroborate,” said Marcia firmly.

“Why do you speak in that tone, as though you were finding fault with them, poor darlings, for being young and sweet and childish, and innocent?”

“Mother,” said Marcia, and now she rose from her seat and dropped on her knees by the invalid’s couch, “do you think that I really blame them for being young and innocent? But I do blame them for something else.”

“And what is that?”

“For being selfish: for thinking of themselves more than for others.”

“I don’t understand you.”

“If you will consider for a moment I think you will quite understand what I mean.”

“Marcia, my head aches; I cannot stand a long argument.”

“Nor will I give it to you. I have come back here to help you – ”

“Why, of course, you were sent for for that purpose.”

Marcia felt a very fierce wave of passion rising for a moment in her heart. After all, she had her passions, her strong feelings, her idiosyncrasies. She was not tame; she was not submissive; hers was a firm, steadfast, reliable nature. Hers also was a proud and rebellious one. Nevertheless, she soon conquered the rising irritation. She knew that this bad hour would have to be lived through.

“I am glad you are talking to me quite plainly,” she said, “and I on my part will answer you in the same spirit. I have come back here not because I must, for as a matter of fact, I am my own mistress. You see, by my own dear mother’s will I have sufficient money of my own – not a great deal, but enough to support me. I can, therefore, be quite independent; and the fact that by my mother’s will I was made of age at twenty, puts all possibility of misconstruction of my meaning out of the question.”

“Marcia, you are so terribly learned; you use such long words; you talk as though you were forty. Now, my poor children – ”

“Mother, you are quite a clever woman yourself, and of course you know what I mean. I have come back to help you, because I wished to – not because I was forced to do so.”

“Molly says you are terribly conceited; I am afraid she is right.”

Marcia took no notice of this.

“Although I have come back to help you, I have not come back to ruin my young sisters.”

“Now, Marcia, you really are talking the wildest nonsense.”

“Not at all. Don’t you want them to love you?”

Mrs Aldworth burst into tears.

“What a dreadful creature you are,” she said. “As though my own sweet children did not love me. Why, they’re madly devoted to me. If my little finger aches they’re in such a state – you never knew anything like it. I have seen my poor Molly obliged to rush from the room when I have been having a bad attack of my neuralgia, just because her own precious nerves could not stand the agony. Not love me? How dare you insinuate such a thing?”

“Mother, we evidently have different ideas with regard to love. My idea is this – that you ought to sacrifice yourself for the one you love. Now, if I came here and took the complete charge of you away from your own daughters; if I gave them nothing whatever to do for you, and if they were to spend their entire time amusing themselves, and not once considering you, I should do them a cruel wrong; I should injure their characters, and I should make them, what they are already inclined to be – most terribly selfish. That, God helping me, I will not do. I will share the charge of you with them, or I will return to Frankfort to Mrs Silchester, whom I love; to the life that I delight in; to the friends I have made. I will not budge an inch; I will nurse you with the girls, or not at all.”

Mrs Aldworth looked up. After all, with a captious, fretful, irritable invalid, a woman with so vacillating a nature as Mrs Aldworth’s, there was nothing so effective as firmness. She succumbed. In a minute she had flung her arms round Marcia’s neck.

“My darling,” she said, “I do see what you mean. And you are right; you will train them, you will be, in my absence, a mother to them.”

“Not a mother, for I, like them, am young; but I will be to them an elder sister, and I will teach them – not in words, but by precept and by sympathy and by love, what I should like them to learn. They want a great deal of looking after; and, first of all, they want a complete change in their method of living.”

“I am afraid even for them, and for you, I cannot quite ignore my pain, my constant suffering, my weary nights, my long, long, fatiguing days.”

“Of course you cannot, and I have said enough for the present. Now, let us have a jolly time. See, I am going to have a particularly nice tea for you this afternoon. I have told Susan to bring it up when it is ready. We’ll have it on that balcony.”

“Oh, but I shall catch cold.”

“Indeed you won’t. Do you see that shady corner, and how the scent-laden air is pervading the whole place, and the sun will be shining across the other half, and you can see a long way down the garden? I’ll sit near you and read to you when you like, out of such a funny book.”

“My taste and yours don’t agree with regard to reading,” said Mrs Aldworth, always glad to hail any interruption. “I suppose I have degenerated; I am certainly not an intellectual woman; I don’t pretend that I am. I like the stories that are in the penny papers. We get two or three of them, and we always enjoy them. Will you read me one of those?”

“No, mother.”

“Oh, how cross you are!”

“I am very sorry, mother, but I will read you something just as amusing. Did you ever hear of ‘The Reminiscences of an Irish R.M.’?”

“No, it sounds very dull.”

“Wait till you hear it. It will make you laugh a great deal more than the stories in the penny papers.”

“They make me cry a great deal. Molly reads rather badly, but yesterday I found myself weeping in the middle of the night over the woes of the poor little heroine. I am sure the next number of the paper has come in, and I am so anxious to know if she is really married to the Earl of Dorchester.”

“It will be Nesta’s turn to-morrow, and she can read to you. Now for the balcony and a pleasant time.” They had a pleasant time, and the hours flew by on wings. Marcia told stories; she laughed, she chatted, and she read a little from “The Reminiscences of an Irish R.M.” Mrs Aldworth laughed till the tears ran down her cheeks.

“Oh, rich! rich!” she exclaimed. “That scene with the dog is inimitable. How funny, how truly funny! But, Marcia, isn’t it bad for my nerves to laugh so much?”

“It’s the best thing for them in all the world.”

“Marcia, you are wonderful!”

“Now for the new fancy work,” said Marcia.

She taught the invalid a different sort of stitch from any which she had before learned. She gave her bright-coloured silks, and a piece of art cloth to embroider upon, and soon her stepmother was so fascinated that she allowed her young companion to work in silence, often raising her eyes to look across the distant garden.

The girls were spending the afternoon in the garden; but presently they went out, all three of them gaudily and badly dressed. They walked through the garden, gathered some roses, and then disappeared through a little wicket gate at the further end.

Marcia felt quite sure that they did this for the purpose of showing her how they were enjoying themselves, while she was in prison. She smiled to herself.

“Poor little things,” she thought. “I wonder how soon I shall win their hearts.”

She had marked out a plan of action for herself. She had practically secured Mrs Aldworth – not for long, of course, for Nesta would turn her round the next day, and Molly the day after. It would be a constant repetition of the battle; but in the end she would win her. The girls, of course, were different. Unselfishness must be born within them before they really did what Marcia wanted them to do. Unselfishness, brave hearts, pure spirits, noble ways.

“Two, three months should do it,” thought the girl; “then I can go back with Angela St. Just in the autumn; for she is returning to Frankfort, I know, just to be with Mrs Silchester, and I can take her back. Oh, little Angela!”

Marcia recalled the soft touch of Angela’s blooming cheek; the look in her lovely eyes; the refinement in all her bearing.

Mrs Aldworth indulged in a nap; but now tea appeared and there was again bustle and movement, and when Mr Aldworth entered the room presently, he was so surprised at the improvement in his wife that he scarcely knew her.

“Marcia, you are a magician,” he said.

“You must uphold me with regard to the girls,” said Marcia.

“Of course, dear, you must uphold her. She has been explaining things to me,” said the wife. “She says that my children are exceedingly selfish.”

“I have always known that,” replied Mr Aldworth, looking at his daughter.

Mrs Aldworth began to frown. “I must say I think it is very unkind of you to say so; but of course you stick up for Marcia, and you abuse my poor children. That is always the way. I suppose just because Marcia’s mother thought herself a fine county lady and I – my people only in common trade, that – ”

“Oh, hush, Amelia,” said her husband.

“Mother – dear mother!” said Marcia.

Mr Aldworth backed out of the room as quickly as he could. He met his son on the stairs.

“Don’t go in,” he said. “She’s as jealous as ever she can be. Like a bear with a sore head. The girls are all out enjoying themselves and Marcia is keeping guard. I must say that she makes an excellent nurse. I believe your mother will be ever so much better in a short time. She has her out on the balcony, prettily dressed, surrounded by coloured silks and all that sort of thing, and Marcia herself is looking like a picture.”