Our room was at the back of the house, and from where I lay I could see through the window a strip of gray, desolate sky, broken here and there by a chimney, and across which the dark branch of an unhealthy tree waved. As I watched it, my mind strayed to a book of Japanese decorations, and to the library at Derryaghy, and to other things I cared for. I had already guessed from the little I had seen of the McAllisters that their fortunes were drooping. It was not so much that everything in the house was worn out and patched and on its last legs, that the children were ill-clad and looked ill-nourished, as that I seemed to scent that mysterious atmosphere of anxiety, worry, and struggle, which invariably accompanies a decreasing ability to pay one’s way. I hated it. I hated all that it implied――sordid economies and cheap pleasures, a degrading and enchaining struggle to keep things going. It did not awaken pity in me, but only disgust. It was like a horrible monster that clung and squeezed with a thousand slimy tentacles, sapping your strength, and sucking out your life-blood. I could even sympathise with those who had freed themselves from it by some bold decisive action, that might lie well outside the laws of morality and society. In the midst of these reflections George informed me that I had better get up. He was tying his tie. His red hair was carefully plastered down with water, and he was examining his small, freckled face in the looking-glass. George had not yet begun to shave, but he had long, silly-looking hairs growing out of his chin, and I thought he looked extremely ugly and horribly common as he stood there. When we went downstairs the others were just beginning breakfast. The whole family was terribly _endimanchée_. Aunt Margaret was redolent of cheap scent. Gordon and Thomas were dressed in green plush with white mother-of-pearl buttons. Their little, damp, red, snub noses seemed to have been set that very morning accidentally in the middle of their round faces, which were of the complexion of fresh putty, and their eyes were exactly like blue glass marbles. Uncle George, who was breakfasting in his gray shirt sleeves, suggested that I might like to go with George to the Bible-class, but I refused. I added, to prevent all future trouble, that I preferred to take a walk on Sunday morning. “Do you go for walks when you are at home?” Aunt Margaret asked me, with her strange smile. “No,” I answered. “Doesn’t your father expect you to go to church?” “I don’t know what he expects, I’m sure.” “And don’t you think yourself you ought to go?” “No.” I was quite certain about this at all events, and I added that, once you were familiar with any particular ideas, no matter how valuable, I couldn’t see that you gained very much by listening to them being repeated ad infinitum.