MARGARET. [_Rising with a sigh_] You’re quite right. [_Calling at the foot of the stairs_] Sydney, darling, shall I bring you up your coffee? SYDNEY’S VOICE. [_Answering_] It’s all right, Mother! I’m coming. MISS FAIRFIELD. And I suppose that’s all you’ll say. SYDNEY _comes out of her room. She is physically a bigger, fairer edition of_ MARGARET, _but there the likeness ends. Her manner is brisk and decided. She is very sure of herself, but when she loses her temper, as she often does, she loses her aplomb and reveals the schoolgirl. Her attitude to the world is that of justice, untempered, except where her mother is in question, by mercy. But she is very fond of her mother._ SYDNEY. [_Running down the stairs_] Merry Christmas, everyone! I’m not late, am I? Morning, Auntie! What, no post? MARGARET. It gets later every year. MISS FAIRFIELD. I’m very much obliged to you, Sydney, for the--card-case. SYDNEY. [_Undoing her parcels_] It’s a cigarette case, Auntie dear. You see, I thought if you gave me a prayer-book again we might do a deal. Ah, I thought so! Thanks most awfully. It’s sweet of you. Shall we? MISS FAIRFIELD. What? SYDNEY. Swop. MARGARET. Sydney, dear, that’s rather rude. SYDNEY. [_Swiftly_] Well, Mother, I hate being hinted at. MARGARET. [_Bewildered_] Hint? What hint? SYDNEY. Oh, Mother, you’re such a lamb. You never see anything. [_To_ MISS FAIRFIELD] I’m sorry, Auntie, but I’m seventeen, and I’ve left school, and I am not going to church to-day, or any day any more ever, except to chaperon Mother and Gray next week, bless ’em! MISS FAIRFIELD. I do think, Margaret, she ought at least to call him Uncle. MARGARET. Aren’t you coming with us to-day, darling? Christmas Day? SYDNEY. Sorry, Mother. It’s against my principles. I refuse to kneel down and say I’m a miserable sinner. I’m not miserable and I’m not a sinner, and I cannot tell a lie to please any old--prayer-book. Besides, I’m expecting Kit. MISS FAIRFIELD. You’ll find that Kit takes his mother to church. _She_ hasn’t lost all her influence-- SYDNEY. [_Darkly_] She’ll be finding herself up against me soon. MARGARET. [_Like a schoolgirl_] Oh, Sydney, has he--? SYDNEY. He’s trying his hardest to, but I like to sort of _spread_ my jam. MARGARET. Then--then--? SYDNEY. I’m not actually engaged, if you mean that-- [_Watching their faces mischievously_] but I’m going to be. MISS FAIRFIELD. Engaged at seventeen! Preposterous! SYDNEY. [_Instantly_] Mother was married at seventeen. MARGARET. That was the war. SYDNEY. I don’t see what that’s got to do with it. MARGARET. [_Timidly_] Sydney--at seventeen, one doesn’t know enough-- SYDNEY. One doesn’t know the same things, I dare say. MARGARET. One doesn’t know anything at all. SYDNEY. Yes, but think of the hopeless sort of world you were seventeen in--even you. As for poor Auntie, as far as knowing things goes-- MARGARET. Sydney, my dear, be good!