tance than the clock's
statement that it was midnight. Her "Now, mother, we're later and later.
It's striking to-morrow, now!" referred to present life and present
bedtime, and her rapid adjustment of the spools meant business.

The old Granny showed no sense of having escaped an embarrassment. She
did not shy off to another subject. On the contrary, she went back to
the topic it had hinged on. "Eighty-one come January!" said she,
lighting her own candle. "And please God I may see ninety, and only be
the worse by the price of a new pair of glasses to read my Testament.
Parson Dunage's mother at the Rectory, she's gone stone-deaf, and one
may shout oneself hoarse. But everyone else than you, child, _I_ can
hear plain enough. There's naught to complain of in _my_ hearing, yet a
while."

Granny Marrable's conscience stung her yet again about Mrs. Picture's
departure unrefreshed. "I would have been the happier for knowing that
that old soul was none the worse," said she. But all the answer she got
was:--"Be quiet, mother, you'll wake up Toby."

She harped on the same string next day, the immediate provocation to the
subject being a visit from Keziah Solmes the old keeper's wife--you
remember her connection Keziah; she who remonstrated with her husband
about the use of fire-arms, and nearly saved Adrian Torrens's
eyesight?--who had been driven over, in a carrier's cart that kept up a
daily communication between the Towers and Chorlton, in pursuance of an
arrangement suggested one day by Gwen. Why should not Widow Thrale's
convalescents, when good, enjoy the coveted advantages of a visit to the
Towers? Mrs. Keziah Solmes had welcomed the opportunity for her grandson
Seth. Seth was young, but with well-marked proclivities and aspirations,
one of which was a desire for male companionship, preferably of boys
older than himself, whom he could incite to acts of lawlessness and
destruction he was still too small to commit effectually. He despised
little girls. He had been pleased with the account given of the
convalescent Toby, and had consented to receive him on stated terms,
having reference to the inequitable distribution of cake in his own
favour. Hence this visit of his grandmamma to Strides Cottage, with the
end in view that she should return with Toby, who for his part had
undertaken to be good, with secret reservations in his own mind as to
special opportunities to be bad, created by temporary withdrawals of
control.