The sitting-room was most untidy. Children's toys were strewn about; the carpet was raggedy the pictures hung askew, the red plush table-cloth-it was a most abominable covering-was stained, the blind was torn, and a broken window-pane had been filled up with brown paper. Yet the room had a comfortable, homely look, and if it had not been so disorderly, would have been pleasant to live in. But Mrs. Baldwin, quite undisturbed by the confusion, read on with great enjoyment. She only lifted her eyes when Laura Mason entered the room, and then her first words were querulous.
"How you can bear to stop here with Getty when your own home is so beautiful, I really don't know," moaned Mrs. Baldwin, keeping her place in the tale by bending the book backward. "Just look at this room. I may toil from morning to night, and it never will look tidy."
"It's comfortable, at all events," said Laura, sitting down. "Do you feel well this morning, Mrs. Baldwin."
"Just alive. I could hardly get out of bed. Not a wink of sleep, and dreadful dreams."
Mrs. Baldwin did not explain how she could dream without sleeping, but she was such a wonderful woman that she could do anything. For instance, she could be idle throughout the day, and keep up the fiction that she worked like a slave. She could enjoy her life in laziness and dirt and selfishness, posing as a martyr to every one. Laura saw through her as most people did; but as Laura was a guest, and Gerty's friend, she did not explain herself at length, as she would have liked to do. Besides, Mrs. Baldwin was a good-natured old dormouse, and no one could be angry with her long.
"I have been out with Gerty," said Laura, sitting near the window; "she has gone to the factory to see Mr. Tracey."
"She never thinks of me slaving from morning till night," moaned the mother. "I'm skin and bone."
Miss Mason nearly laughed outright, for Mrs. Baldwin was as fat as butter, and quite as soft. "You should take more care of yourself."
"No, Miss Mason," said the heroic woman. "I must deny myself all pleasures for the sake of my babes. Ah, they will never know what a mother they have."
It certainly would not be for the want of telling, for Mrs. Baldwin was always recounting her virtues at length. She did so now. "When I was young and gay, and truly lovely, and lived with ma in Soho Square," she rambled on, "I little thought that life would be so hard. When Mr. Harrow led me to the altar, all was sunshine, but now penury and disgrace are my portion."
"Oh, not so bad as that, Mrs. Baldwin," protested Laura.
"Penury, disgrace, and desertion, Miss Mason. Rufus Baldwin has left me with six pledges of his affection, and but for the forethought of my first husband-who must have foreseen the twins-I would have starved in chains and miry clay."
Having thus placed herself in the lowest position she could think of, in order to extort sympathy, Mrs. Baldwin ate more Turkish delight-she was too selfish to offer Laura any-and stated that her heart was broken. "Though I don't show it, being trained by ma to bear my woes in silence," she finished.
Laura said a few words of comfort in order to stop further complaints, and then stated that she was going to Westcliff-on-Sea in two days. "My sister Julia is expecting me," she said, "and I have been with you for over a week. It is so good of you to have me."
"Not at all. I've done my best to make you comfortable, Miss Mason, though heaven knows I can hardly keep on my feet." Here Mrs. Baldwin closed her eyes as a token of extreme exhaustion. "But we must do our duty in the world, as I always tell Horry, who is to be a parson, if he can pass the examinations, which I doubt. Of course Gerty will marry Mr. Tracey, who is well off, and leave her poor ma, who has done so much for her. But I am determined that my babes shall occupy the best places in society. Totty, Dolly, and Sally shall marry money. Jimmy and Dickey must win renown to repay me for my lifelong agonies. You don't look well, Miss Mason?"
The suddenness of this question, coming so quickly after the rambling discourse, made Laura start and colour. She was a fair, pretty girl, with yellow hair and a creamy complexion. Her eyes were dark, her mouth delightful, and her nose was "tip-tilted like the petal of a flower," to quote her favourite poet. Not a particularly original girl either in looks or character, but charming and sympathetic. Laura had a wide circle of friends who all loved her, but no one could call her clever. But she was so womanly that men liked her. "I am quite well, Mrs. Baldwin," she declared; "only I did not sleep much last night."
"Dreams! dreams!" moaned Mrs. Baldwin. "I had horrible dreams about you. I fancied I saw you eating bananas. Every one knows that means trouble. But pine-apples growing in ice are the worst," said Mrs. Baldwin. "I have never dreamed that. Trouble is coming to you."
"Don't!" cried Laura, starting to her feet, and with an anxious air; "please don't! I think dreams are nonsense."
"No," said Mrs. Baldwin, producing a small book from under her sofa pillow. "Read this, and see what it means to dream of sparrows pecking cats to death."
Laura laughed. "I should rather think the cats would eat the birds."
"Not in a dream. Everything goes by contraries in dreams. Before John Baldwin ran away, I dreamed he was rushing into my arms, crowned with honeysuckle. But that day he went. Didn't your walk last night do you good?"
"No," said Laura shortly, then went on with some hesitation. "I was away only for half an hour."
"Where did you go?"
"Across the fields."
"Thinking of Mr. Calvert, no doubt," said Mrs. Baldwin playfully.
Laura grew red, and on another occasion would have resented this remark about the young gentleman mentioned by Mrs. Baldwin. But at this moment she appeared to be rather glad of the suggestion. "I was thinking of him," she assented.
"A very nice young man, though he is an actor."
"Why shouldn't he be an actor?" demanded Laura angrily.
"There! there!" said Mrs. Baldwin soothingly; and aggravatingly, "We know that love levels all ranks."
"Arnold Calvert is a gentleman."
"Your sister, Mrs. Fane, doesn't think so. She expressed herself much annoyed that he should pay his addresses to you."
"Julia can mind her own business," said Laura angrily. "She married Mr. Fane, and he wasn't a very good match."
"No indeed. Your sister had the money."
"And I have money also. Quite enough for Arnold and I to live on, as you-" Here Laura held her tongue. She really did not see why she should tell Mrs. Baldwin all her private affairs. But when the heart is very full, the tongue will speak out. Luckily at this moment there was another outburst of noise overhead, and Mrs. Baldwin moaned three times.
"The bad twins are persecuting the good ones, and the odd ones are looking on," she lamented. "Do go up and see, Miss Mason."
Laura, glad of an excuse to leave the room, saw Mrs. Baldwin with another lump of delight in her mouth, and another page turned, and flew up the stairs. Here she found a general rebellion. The bad twins, Totty and Dickey, aged ten, were pinching the good twins, Jimmy and Sally, aged twelve. Horry and Dolly, who, not being twins, were called the odd ones, looked on complacently. Laura darted into the middle of the fray, and parted the fighters.
"Horry! Dolly! You ought to be ashamed of yourselves to see these children fight so. Horry, you are fourteen, and you, Dolly, are seventeen. Why don't you behave?"
"We are behaving," said Dolly, a girl in the stage of long legs, short frocks, and inky fingers. "We haven't touched them. I can't study my French lesson for the noise."
"And I've got my algebra to do."
"You shouldn't learn lessons on Sunday," said Laura.
"Why not? Gerty's gone to business."
"She has not. She only went to see if Mr. Tracey found his motor-car that was lost last night."
"Ah! And I'm glad of it," cried