"I had tact, Jeremy." She spoke with overpowering solidity. "I was there when he wanted me, and when he didn't want me I wasn't there, Sibylla." "Didn't he always want you?" Brother and sister put the question simultaneously, but with a quite different intention. "No, not always, dears.--Is that your foot on my table? Take it off this instant, Jeremy!" "Quite a few thousand years ago there was no difference between a foot and a hand, Mumples. You needn't be so fussy about it." Sibylla got up and walked to the window. From it the lights in Grantley's dining-room were visible. "I haven't seen him for ten years," Mrs. Mumple went on; "and you've known that, my dears, though you've said nothing--no, not when you'd have liked to have something to throw at me. But I never told you why." Sibylla left the window and came behind Mrs. Mumple, letting her hand rest on the fat shoulder. "He broke out at me once, and said he couldn't bear it if I came to see him. It upset him so, and the time wouldn't pass by, and he got thinking how long the time was, and what it all meant. Oh, I can't tell you all he said before he was stopped by the--the man who was there. So I promised him I wouldn't go any more, unless he fell ill or wanted me. They said they'd let me know if he asked for me and was entitled to a visit. But word has never come to me, and I've never seen him." She paused and stitched at her work for a minute or two. "You must leave men alone sometimes," she said. "But, Mumples, you?" whispered Sibylla. Mrs. Mumple looked up at her, but made no answer. Jeremy flung down his book with an impatient air; he resented the approaches of emotion--especially in himself. "He'll be old when he comes out--comes back--old and broken; they break quickly there. He won't so much mind my being old and stout, and he won't think so much of the time when I was young and he couldn't be with me; and he'll find me easier to live with: my temper's improved a lot these last years, Sibylla." "You silly old thing!" said Sibylla. But Jeremy welcomed a diversion. "Rot!" he said. "It's only because you can't sit on us quite so much now. It's not moral improvement; it's simply impotence, Mumples." Mrs. Mumple had risen in the midst of eulogising the improvement of her temper, and now passed by Jeremy, patting his unwilling cheek. She went out, and the next moment was heard in vigorous altercation with their servant as to the defects of certain eggs. "I couldn't have done that," said Sibylla. "Improved your temper?" "No, stayed away." "No, you couldn't. You never let a fellow alone, even when he's got toothache." "Have you got it now?" cried Sibylla, darting towards him. "Keep off! Keep off! I haven't got it, and if I had I shouldn't want to be kissed." Sibylla broke into a laugh. Jeremy relit his pipe with a secret smile. "But I do call it fine of Mumples."