She couldn't look at her mother. She didn't want to see her cry. "You've found that out, have you? You've been mighty quick about it." "I found it out ages ago. But I didn't mean to tell you." Her mother was not crying. "You needn't tell me now," she said. "You don't suppose I'm going to believe it?" Not crying. Smiling. A sort of cunning and triumphant smile. "You just want an excuse for not learning those Thirty-Nine Articles." XIV I. Mamma was crying. Papa had left the dining-room. Mary sat at the foot of the table, and her mother at the head. The space between was covered and piled with Mark's kit: the socks, the pocket-handkerchiefs, the vests, the fine white pyjamas. The hanging white globes of the gaselier shone on them. All day Mary had been writing "M.E. Olivier, M.E. Olivier," in clear, hard letters, like print. The iridescent ink was grey on the white linen and lawn, black when you stamped with the hot iron: M.E. Olivier. Mamma was embroidering M.E.O. in crimson silk on a black sock. Mark was in the Army now; in the Royal Field Artillery. He was going to India. In two weeks, before the middle of April, he would be gone. They had known this so long that now and then they could forget it; they could be glad that Mark should have all those things, so many more, and more beautiful, than he had ever had. They were appeased with their labour of forming, over and over again, the letters, clear and perfect, of his name. Then Papa had come in and said that Dan was not going to live at home any more. He had taken rooms in Bloomsbury with young Vickers. Dan had not gone to Cambridge when he left Chelmsted, as Mamma had intended. There hadn't been enough money. Uncle Victor had paid for Mark's last year at Woolwich and for his outfit now. Some day Mamma would pay him back again. Dan had gone first into Papa's office; then into Uncle Edward's office. He was in Uncle Victor's office now. Sometimes he didn't get home till after midnight. Sometimes when you went into his room to call him in the morning he wasn't there; but there were the bed-clothes turned down as Catty had left them, with his nightshirt folded on the top. Her mother said: "I hope you're content now you've finished your work." "_My_ work?" her father said. "Yes, yours. You couldn't rest till you'd got the poor boy out of your office, and now you've turned him out of the house. I suppose you thought that with Mark going you'd better make a clean sweep. It'll be Roddy next." "I didn't turn him out of the house. But it was about time he went. The young cub's temper is getting unbearable." "I daresay. You ruined Dan's temper with your silly tease--tease--tease--from morning till night. You can't see a dog without wanting to make it snap and snarl. It was the same with all the children. And when they turned you bullied them. Just because you couldn't break Mark's spirit you tried to crush Dan's. It's a wonder he has any temper left." Emilius stroked his beard.