"I really must apologise, old chap--I really must. Shan't let it occur again," Sir William said, good-humoredly. He could not very well tell Nixon that he had spent the interval in personally cleaning up with pieces of newspaper the mess by the fireplace, for fear Lady Frances should happen in and see it while they were away. Upstairs, in Lady Frances' own sitting-room--a big, airy apartment, in which, on quiet afternoons, she read or sewed or knitted, or napped in the old arm-chair she had brought with her from overseas--the venerable lady of the house had set herself the task of entertaining the mother of her son's wife. "Ineffably, innately common and nasty-natured," had been her inward pronouncement when first she faced Lovina Nixon; but there had been no outward sign, although one who knew the old gentlewoman's ways might have discerned a more careful and precise politeness in her attitude. Now, on this afternoon of the last day of the Nixons' stay, which had endured, for what Lady Frances had termed, in a matin soliloquy, "three dreadful days", she had steeled herself to the duty of making the time pass agreeably until evening and train-time should bring deliverance. Ada, the maid, had brought the tea-urn and "curate"; and now the three women--Lady Frances in her big chair; Mrs. John Nixon dangling one of the fine china tea-cups, which she had drained at a draught, from her forefinger, and eating cake with her elbow on the table and the cake scattering crumbs as she gesticulated with the hand that held it; and Daisy holding a skein of yarn, from which Lady Frances was winding a ball--sat ill-assorted in the large room. "Do have some more tea, Mrs. Nixon, won't you?" invited Lady Frances, eyeing the suspended teacup nervously. "Daisy, dear, give your mother some more tea." But, as Mrs. Nixon had already had three cups, the urn was empty. Daisy hopped up and carried the shapely silver receptacle to the kitchen, to get some more hot water from Jean's kettle. As the door closed after her daughter, Mrs. Lovina Nixon leaned over toward Lady Frances with a greenish light in her eyes. "I s'pose it ain't no use o' tellin' you, Mam, now," she said; "I mean, now that your son's tight married to her and can't get loose, that yen girl run away from us. Yes, sir--run away with a feller. Never seen nawthun like it in all m' born days. Never did." And Mrs. Lovina nid-nodded and sowed caraway seed on the carpet in showers as she vibrated the cake. "Just like'r, though," she supplemented, after a moment, "so it was. 'Xpected somethin' like it, all along. Warn't s'prised one iota." "Your daughter," Lady Frances said--very slowly, and governing her voice with difficulty--"has quite voluntarily told us all the circumstances you mention. I--I really do not think," the old gentlewoman could barely keep the frost out of her tone, "that we should discuss her in her absence. I really don't think we should."