"He used to be a very pretty little boy. A little boy! And now!" Christine plucked idly at the fringes of her hand-screen.
"And mamma says the woman was thirty, and not very good-looking either!"
"What a lot you know, Anna! You're hardly seventeen, are you? And Suzette Bligh's twenty-seven! But she's a baby compared to you."
"Oh, mamma always tells me things – or else I hear her and papa talking about them. When I'm washing the dogs, they forget I'm there, especially if they're squabbling at all. And I keep my ears open."
"Yes, I think you do."
"But generally mamma tells me. She always must talk to somebody, you see. When I was little she used to tell me things, and then forget it and box my ears for knowing them!"
Anna spoke without rancour; rather with a sort of quiet amusement, as though she had given much study to her mother's peculiarities and found permanent diversion in them.
"Poor Kate Raymore! So they're in trouble too!"
"Charley was awfully sorry; and they hope he'll come back some day, if he behaves well out there."
"Poor Kate Raymore! Well, there's trouble everywhere, isn't there, Anna?" She shivered and drew yet a little nearer the fire. "How are things at home with you?"
"Just as usual; nothing ever happens with us."
"It might be much worse than that."
"I suppose it might. It's only just rather dull; and I suppose I shall have to endure it for a long while. You see, I'm not very likely to get married, Mrs. Fanshaw. No men ever come to our house – they can't stand it. Besides I'm not pretty."
"Oh, come and meet men here; and never mind not being pretty; I could dress you to look quite smart. That's it! You should go in for smartness, not prettiness. I really believe it pays better nowadays. Get Janet – get your mother to give you an allowance, and we'll put our heads together over it."
"That's awfully kind of you, Mrs. Fanshaw."
"Oh, I like dressing people; and I do think girls ought to have their chances. But in those things she makes you wear – oh, my dear Anna!"
"Yes, I know. I'll ask her. And – "
Anna hesitated, then rose, and came over to Christine. Suddenly she kissed her.
"It's nothing, my dear," said Christine, amused but annoyed; she was very ready to help Anna, but did not care in the least for being kissed by her.
Anna sat down again, and there ensued a long pause.
"And as for not marrying," Christine resumed, "it's six of one and half a dozen of the other, I think. Oh, I should have hated to be an old maid; but still one would have avoided so much worry. Look at these poor Raymores! They've always got on so well too, up to now!"
She laid down her screen and pulled up her dress, to let the warmth get to her ankles. Anna looked at her dainty face lit up by the glow.
"I wish I was like you, Mrs. Fanshaw!"
Christine did not refuse the compliment; she only denied the value of the possession which won it for her.
"Much good it's done me, my dear!" she sighed. "But people who've not got looks never will believe how little good they are. Oh, I didn't mean to be rude, Anna! I believe in you, you know. I can do something with you. Only – " She stopped, frowning a little and looking vaguely unhappy. "Well," she resumed, "if it turns out that I can't take you under my wing, we must get hold of Sibylla. She's always ready to do things for people – and they've got lots of money, anyhow."
Anna's curiosity was turned in the direction of Sibylla.
"What was the truth about Mrs. Imason, Mrs. Fanshaw?"
"I made sure you'd know that too!" smiled Christine. "And if you don't, I suppose I oughtn't to tell you."
"I know she – she had an accident."
"Oh, well, everybody knows. Yes, she had, and they thought it was worse than it was. The country doctor down at Milldean made a mistake – took too serious a view, you know. And – and there was a lot of bother. But the London man said it would be all right, and so it turned out. The baby came all right, and it's a splendid boy."
"It all ended all right, then?"
Christine looked a little doubtful.
"The boy's all right, and Sibylla's quite well," she answered.
"But mamma said Mrs. Raymore hinted – "
"Well, Sibylla wouldn't believe the London man, you see. She thought that he – that he'd been persuaded to say she needn't have the operation she wanted to have, and that they meant to – Well, really, Anna, I can't go into details. It's quite medical, my dear, and I can't express myself discreetly. Anyhow Sibylla made a grievance of it, you know, and relations were a little strained, I think."
"Oh, well, I suppose that's over now, since everything's gone right, Mrs. Fanshaw?"
"It ought to be," said Christine, shy of asserting the positive fact. "But very often fusses about nothing do just as much harm as fusses about something big. It's the way one looks at them."
"Yes, I ought to know that, living in our house," remarked Anna Selford.
"You do give your parents away so!" Christine complained, with a smile in which pity was mingled.
The pity, however, was not for the betrayed, but for the traitor. Anna's premature knowingness and the suggestion of hardness it carried with it were the result of a reaction against the atmosphere of her home, against the half-real gush and the spasmodic emotionality of the family circle. In this revolt truth asserted itself, but sweetness suffered, and freshness lost its bloom. Christine was sorry when that sort of thing happened to young girls. But there it was. Anna was not the ingénue, and it was no good treating her as if she were.
"I'm really half glad you don't live in this house. I'm sure John and I couldn't bear the scrutiny – not just now, anyhow." She answered Anna's questioning eyes by going on: "Oh, it's terrible, my dear. We've no money – now, really, don't repeat that! And John's full of business worries. It's positively so bad that I have to try to be amiable about it!"
"I'm so sorry, and I really won't talk about it, Mrs. Fanshaw."
"No, don't, my dear – not till we're in the bankruptcy court. Then everybody'll know. And I daresay we shall have some money again; at least bankrupts seem to have plenty generally."
"Then why don't you?"
"Anna! John would cut his throat first. Oh, I really believe he would! You've no idea what a man like him thinks of his business and of his firm's credit. It's like – well, it's like what we women ought to think (again Christine avoided asserting the actual fact) about our reputations, you know. So you may imagine the state of things. The best pair is being sold at Tattersall's this very day. That's why I'm indoors – cabs are so cold and the other pair will have to go out at night."
Shiveringly she nestled to the fire again.
"I'm so awfully sorry, Mrs. Fanshaw! It'll all come right, won't it?"
"It generally does; but I don't know. And John says I've always been so extravagant – and I suppose I have. Well, I thought it was just that John was stingy. He had a splendid business, you know." She paused and smiled at Anna. "So now you know all of everybody's troubles," she ended.
Christine was not in the habit of giving praise beyond measure or without reservation either to herself or to other people, and she had done no more than justice to her present effort to be amiable. Money was the old cause of quarrel between her husband and herself; the alternation of fat and lean years had kept it always alive and intermittently active. But hitherto, while the fat seasons had meant affluence, the lean had never fallen short of plenty or of solvency. It had been a question of more or less lavish expenditure; that was all. Christine was afraid there was more now. Her husband