And at the end of it all the only remark which Rosa vouchsafed was a repetition of the one which had caused Sergeant-Major Flannery to leave the table short one egg and a slice of bacon of his normal allowance. "I didn't think she was so beautiful," said Rosa, tossing a bobbed auburn head. Whether this deplorable attitude would have reduced Mrs. Evans to a despairing silence or caused her to repeat her observations with renewed energy will never be known, for at this moment one of the bells above the dresser jangled noisily. "That's Him," said Mrs. Evans. "Go and see what He wants." She usually referred to the proprietor of Healthward Ho by means of a pronoun with a capital letter, disapproving, though she recognized its aptness, of her assistant's preference for the soubriquet of Old Monkey Brand. "If it's His breakfast, tell Him it'll be ready in a minute." Rosa departed. "It's not His breakfast," she announced, returning. "It's the Case Upstairs's breakfast. Old Monkey Brand wants to have a look at it before it's took him." "Don't call Him Old Monkey Brand." "Well, it's what he looks like, isn't it?" "Never mind," replied Mrs. Evans, and resumed her speculations as to what her mother would have said. "He's to have some bacon and eggs and toast and a potter coffee," said Rosa, showing rather a lack of interest in Mrs. Evans's mother. "And old Lord Twist wants to have a look at it before it's took him. It all depends what you call beautiful," said Rosa. "If you're going to call anyone beautiful that's got touched-up hair and eyes like one of those vamps in the pictures, well, all I can say is..." "That's enough," said Mrs. Evans. Silence reigned in the kitchen, broken only by the sizzling of bacon and the sniffs of a modern girl who did not see eye to eye with her elders on the subject of feminine beauty. "Here you are," said Mrs. Evans at length. "Get me one of them trays and the pepper and salt and mustard and be careful you don't drop it." "Drop it? Why should I drop it?" "Well, don't." "There was a woman in _Hearts and Satins_ that had eyes just like hers," said Rosa, balancing the tray and speaking with the cold scorn which good women feel for their erring sisters. "And what she didn't do! Apart from stealing all them important papers relating to the invention...." "You're spilling that coffee." "No, I'm not." "Well, don't," said Mrs. Evans. II Out in the garden, hidden from the gaze of any who might espy him and set him to work, Sergeant-Major Flannery lolled in the shrubbery, savouring that best smoke of the day, the after-breakfast pipe. He was still ruffled, for Dolly had made a deep impression on him and any statement to the effect that she was not a thing of loveliness ranked to his thinking under the head of blasphemy.