“I’m willing to overlook it,” said Minnie. “Anyway, what does it matter what such a woman says? It won’t do for you to quarrel with your brother.” “I don’t intend to. We’ll simply let the thing drop. But of course Julie can’t come here again, and we won’t enter her house.” “It isn’t her house; it’s your brother’s----” “I say! What are you driving at, Minnie? Haven’t you any pride?” She began to cry. “We’ll need a great deal of help from Horace,” she said, “and she’s quite capable of turning him against us. This baby’s going to be a terrible expense.” He rebelled rather vigorously at first, but of course, in the end, succumbed. Minnie’s sole view of the expected baby as an anxiety and a crushing responsibility had begun to infect him. He too commenced to see it only as an expense that must be met--and met by Horace. She reiterated ceaselessly that it was their “duty” to this child to humiliate themselves, sacrifice all pride and independence. A curious doctrine, that the parents exist only to sustain their offspring, forever deprived of any original existence, any private aims, living only to convey physical nourishment. III The day came, the terrible expense began, and Minnie’s child entered the world. It must be admitted that Minnie behaved very badly. She was never good at enduring pain, and she was moreover in terror of dying. Altogether a bad time, for her, for the doctor, for the nurse, and for poor Lionel. But once the child was born, her fierce maternal passion flamed into life. She would have died to defend her baby. She nearly destroyed it with indulgence. That was her manner of loving. And she believed that the fact of having this child constituted a claim upon all the world. That whatever she did for its sake was fully justified. Because she loved it, she was licensed to take what she could for it, by any and all means to secure advantages for it. A sort of divine license given only to mothers, so that they could do no wrong; an unlimited indulgence. Be assured that she took advantage of it! CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE I They went on, God knows how, for two years. Always in debt, always harassed, gradually going down and down, their style of living always deteriorating, themselves becoming more indifferent, more slovenly. They ate their meals in the kitchen, horrible meals of fried chopped meat and eternal potatoes. The little child was pallid and under-nourished, they bought milk for her dutifully, but Minnie had perverted her appetite with sweets and all sorts of rubbish, and she refused to drink it, unless it were made ‘tasty’ with coffee or tea. Minnie even did the family washing, with incredible labour and pitiful results: Lionel went about dressed in greyish shirts and streaked soft collars. At first he suffered, but very soon he forgot to notice.