She sat there with a sort of triumph on her beautiful face, as if she were pleased with herself because she hadn't said it. And Mary would bring the long sheet that dragged on her wrist, and the needle that pricked her fingers, and sit at Mamma's knee and sew, making a thin trail of blood all along the hem. "Why do you look at me so kindly when I'm sewing?" "Because I like to see you behaving like a little girl, instead of tearing about and trying to do what boys do." And Mamma would tell her a story, always the same story, going on and on, about the family of ten children who lived in the farm by the forest. There were seven boys and three girls. The six youngest boys worked on the farm with their father--yes, he was a _very_ nice father--and the eldest boy worked in the garden with his mother, and the three girls worked in the house. They could cook and make butter and cheese, and bake bread; and even the youngest little girl could knit and sew. "Had they any children?" "No, they were too busy to think about having children. They were all very, very happy together, just as they were." The story was like the hem, there was never any end to it, for Mamma was always finding something else for the three girls to do. She smiled as she told it, as if she saw something that pleased her. Mary felt that she could go on sewing at the hem and pricking her finger for ever if Mamma would only keep that look on her face. VIII I. "I can't, Jenny, I can't. I know there's a funeral coming." Mary stood on the flagstone inside the arch of the open gate. She looked up and down the road and drew back again into the garden. Jenny, tired and patient, waited outside. "I've told you, Miss Mary, there isn't any funeral." "If there isn't there will be. There! I can see it." "You see Mr. Parish's high 'at a driving in his wagonette." It _was_ Mr. Parish's high hat. When he put the black top on his wagonette it looked like a hearse. They started up Ley Street towards Mr. Spall's cottage. Jenny said, "I thought you was going to be such a good girl when Master Roddy went to school. But I declare if you're not twice as tiresome." Roddy had gone to Chelmsted after midsummer. She had to go for walks on the roads with Jenny now at the risk of meeting funerals. This week they had been every day to Ilford to call at Mr. Spall's cottage or at Benny's, the draper's shop in the High Street.