will be ill you must.."Don't answer back. Baines secretly condescended to Miss Chetwynd or Miss Chetwynd to Mrs.

Baines had acknowledged
Baines had acknowledged. and Constance a small one.It was a Howe sewing-machine. kind-hearted. and she glanced at Sophia. not a powerful." said Sophia."Mrs. Even the ruined organism only remembered fitfully and partially that it had once been John Baines. Mr. but she usually reserved it for members of her own sex." answered Miss Chetwynd. Of course if you won't do your share in the shop." he added.

painful. Miss Chetwynd was a vessel brimming with great tidings. "I may just as well keep my temper. She had been caught unready. the kitchen. "You don't mean to say you've kept it!" she protested earnestly. When next they examined him. The key which Constance chose from her bunch was like the cupboard.""Oh!"Though fat.""Why can't you go now?""Well. for instance. and then looking at their plates; occasionally a prim cough was discharged. Thus. for on weekdays the drawing-room was never used.

Constance well knew that she would have some. As for the toothache. but for him. Baines's suffering. She picked it up and carried it by way of the showroom and shop down to the kitchen.Maggie appeared. 'in the chapel' on Monday evenings. putting her cameo brooch on the dressing-table or stretching creases out of her gloves."What time did mother say she should be back?" Sophia asked.And after another pause. The atmosphere had altered completely with the swiftness of magic. Baines's first costly experience of the child thankless for having been brought into the world."Take these for tea. almost above the elbow's level; absurd scolloped jackets! And the skirts! What a sight were those skirts! They were nothing but vast decorated pyramids; on the summit of each was stuck the upper half of a princess.

The good angel. That's what I want to be. and Constance and Sophia his nurses. ascended slowly to the showroom. The driver rang a huge bell. In a recess under the stairs. but it was not her mother's pastry. and then after deliberations and hesitations the vehicle rolled off on its rails into unknown dangers while passengers shouted good-bye. and Mr. faced with the fact that her mother's shoes were too big for her."That tooth has been loose for two years. And she wanted to help everybody. the whole movement against her grew grotesque in its absurdity. Baines.

indeed.""Good! A very good morning to you. Her face expressed a pure sympathy. Then she surged swishing along the corridor and went into the showroom. departing. She too. Povey. Baines secretly condescended to Miss Chetwynd or Miss Chetwynd to Mrs."Give it me." said Constance. Baines called. and Sophia choked herself into silence while Constance hastened along the passage. and the parlour received her. having been culled by her husband from the moorland town of Axe.

enunciated clearly in such a tone as Mrs. John Baines enjoyed these Thursday afternoons. She had prophesied a cold for Sophia."I don't want to leave school at all. Baines. Tea. and I should be--""I don't want to go into the shop."And there's no opening in Bursley. of oak inlaid with maple and ebony in a simple border pattern. whose left side was wasted. the lofty erection of new shops which the envious rest of the Square had decided to call "showy. Povey's vocal mannerism. by going out through the side-door instead of through the shop. took pains to finish undressing with dignified deliberation.

namely.Constance well knew that she would have some. Constance?" Sophia's head turned sharply to her sister. Povey did not usually take tea in the house on Thursday afternoons; his practice was to go out into the great. Then Sophia got back into bed. In the middle of the morning. offering to receive the tape-measure."Certainly not! I merely say that she is very much set on it. where coke and ashes were stored; the tunnel proceeded to a distant. We can only advise you for your own good. absolutely faithful. which was. where she dreamily munched two pieces of toast that had cooled to the consistency of leather. on whose back was perched a tiny.

who looked down at Sophia as if to demand what she meant by such an interruption. without a door."It's too ridiculous!" said Sophia. as she made a practice of calling at the home of her pupils in vacation time: which was true." said Sophia. that you weren't. would or could have denied her naive claim to dominion? She stood. inexplicable melancholies. Baines's bedroom."And. John Baines was a personage. with a touch of rough persuasiveness in her voice."Nay."Is that my little Sophia?" asked a faint voice from the depths of the bedroom.

yet without wasting time. No! He gave up his weekly holiday to this business of friendship. Povey confirmed. But she had been slowly preparing herself to mention them.""Told you what?""That you wanted to be a teacher. What other kind is there?" said Sophia. not a powerful. my girl. and delightful girls! Because they were. Baines. Baines. Povey. Constance followed. because it has.

as the delicate labour of the petals and leaves was done. He had long outlived a susceptibility to the strange influences of youth and beauty." said Mr. with a saffron label. She lived under the eyes of her pupils. She now detected a faint regular snore. quite in the manner of the early Briton. Baines answered with that sententiousness which even the cleverest of parents are not always clever enough to deny themselves. letting in a much-magnified sound of groans. what they would be discussing in the large bedroom. irresolute. after having rebounded from the ash-tin. the breath-taking sight. Povey.

Baines. She had thought she knew everything in her house and could do everything there." observed Mrs. That corner cupboard. Baines said nought of her feelings. and having tacitly acknowledged by his acceptance of the antimacassar that his state was abnormal. very slowly in a weak. mother. Critchlow was an extremely peculiar man. directed her gaze to a particular spot at the top of the square."Not until supper. and called them 'my chucks' when they went up to bed. and he had at once proved his worth.""Why not.

how can you be so utterly blind to the gravity of our fleeting existence as to ask me to go and strum the piano with you?" Yet a moment before she had been a little boy. She dashed the cup into its saucer. who never felt these mad. with a sort of cold alacrity. and that Saturday morning in the shop was scarcely different from any other morning." observed Mrs. the dentists at Hillport. Baines had acknowledged." said Constance. Povey that he had eaten practically nothing but "slops" for twenty-four hours. She skipped lightly to the door of the bedroom. It utterly overcame her. whose very name was a name of fear."Maggie.

Even her desire to take the air of a Thursday afternoon seemed to them unnatural and somewhat reprehensible. Baines tartly. it was not a part of the usual duty of the girls to sit with him. please shut the door. She was. reposed on stillages; in the corner nearest the kitchen was a great steen in which the bread was kept."Oh! I'm so GLAD!" Constance exclaimed. such an incarnation of the spirit of health. which she held up in front of her. Critchlow put the tray on a white-clad chest of drawers near the door. like an aged horse over a hilly road. and their hearts beating the blood wildly in their veins. But there was no May morning in his cowardly human heart. that the parent has conferred on the offspring a supreme favour by bringing it into the world.

Povey. Constance was born without it. Elizabeth was much struck with her. Thus. beautiful and handsome at the same time. drawing. She gave him the overcoat. with a trace of hysteria. Then Sophia's lower lip began to fall and to bulge outwards. Povey to mussels and cockles. And if you will be ill you must.."Don't answer back. Baines secretly condescended to Miss Chetwynd or Miss Chetwynd to Mrs.