She sat half turned from the table--as indeed did the major opposite, their faces towards the window--her feet on a footstool, and her hands busy with work, apparently a new frock she was making for one of her younger children. She wore a faded muslin gown, green its predominant colour; a score of pins, belonging to the work in process, in her waistband. They were talking of the weather. The major was generally in a state of heat. That morning he had walked into Bath and back again, and got in late for dinner, puffing and steaming, for it was an up-hill walk. He liked to have a fly one way at least; but he had not always the money in his pocket to pay for it. "Yes, it was like an oven in the sun, Mary," continued he, enlarging upon the weather. "I don't remember any one single year that the heat has come upon us so early." "That's why I have a good deal of sewing to do just now," observed Mrs. Raynor. "We have had to take to our summer things before they were ready. Look at poor dear little Robert! The child must be melted in that stuff frock." "What's the nurse about?--can't she make him one?" asked the major. "Oh, Francis, she has so much to do. With all these children! She does some sewing; but she has not time for very much." The major, sipping his wine just then, looked at the children, sitting on the grass-plot. Four of them, in whose ages there was evidently more than the usual difference between brothers and sisters. One looked an almost grown-up young lady. That was Alice. She wore a washed-out cotton dress and a frayed black silk apron. Alfred was the next, aged ten, in an old brown-holland blouse and tumbled hair. Kate, in another washed-out cotton and a pinafore, was eight: and Robert was just three, a chubby, fat child in a thick woollen plaid frock. They were stemming cowslips to make into balls, and were as happy as the day was long. "I saw Mrs. Manners in Bath this morning," resumed the major. "She says she is coming to spend a long day here." "I hope she won't come until Bobby's new frock is finished," said Mrs. Raynor, her fingers plying the needle more swiftly at the thought. "He looks so shabby in that old thing." "As if it mattered! Who cares what children have on?" "Oh, I forgot to tell you, Francis--the butcher asked to see me this morning: he came over for orders himself. He says he must have some money." "Oh, does he?" returned the major, with careless unconcern. "I don't know when I shall have any for him, I'm sure. Did you tell him so?" "I did not go to him: I sent Charley. I do hope he will not stop the supply of meat!" "As if he would do that!" cried the major, throwing up his head with a beaming smile. "He knows I shall come into plenty of money sooner or later."