rent. Besides, the contrast hurts; I don't see why a fellow
like Askew should be able to waste money on rash experiments when we have
not enough. However, this leads to another matter; Gerald comes back
tomorrow, and will no doubt, grumble about his poverty. If he does, you
must give him nothing. He has his pay and I make him an allowance. I
won't have his extravagance encouraged."

Grace smiled as Mrs. Osborn got up with a disturbed look. "Mother cannot
have much to give and I have nothing at all. I'm afraid Gerald's talent
for begging will be used in vain."

She went out with Mrs. Osborn and when they had gone Osborn, crossing
the floor to the sideboard, filled his glass to the top. This was his
regular habit and its futility escaped him, although he knew his wife and
daughter knew. He felt he did enough if he exercised some self-denial
when they were about.

In the meantime, Mrs. Osborn sat down on the terrace and looked across
the untidy lawn.

"We need a new pony mower; Jenkins cannot keep the grass in order with
the small machine. He was very obstinate about the bedding plants he
wanted to buy and the borders look thin, but I felt I must be firm," she
said and added drearily: "I wonder when we shall be forced to get a
sporting tenant and live in a smaller house."

"Father would not leave Tarnside. I suppose you don't know how things are
really going?"

"I know they are not going well and suspect they get worse; but he will
not tell me. One could help if one did know."

"I'm afraid I have disappointed father and given you anxieties you need
not have had," Grace replied with some bitterness. "After all, however,
the fault is hardly mine. I wanted to make my own career, but was not
allowed; to work at a useful occupation, would somehow have humiliated
our ridiculous pride, and there was, of course, only one hope left for
you." She paused, and colored as she resumed: "Well, although I am not
sorry, it looks as if that hope had gone."

"It would have been a relief if you had made a good marriage," Mrs.
Osborn admitted. "Still, since you met nobody you like--"

"The men I might perhaps have liked were poor. Father would, no doubt,
think it my natural perversity, or our bad luck; but I don't believe in
luck. It's an excuse for weak makeshifts and futilities; one can conquer
bad fortune if one is resolute."

"None of us, except you, has much resolution," Mrs. Osborn remarked and
sighed. "So far, your firmness