"I don't know." "It was great fun when I did it. How I laughed!" "I didn't laugh. She told me not to." "Well, no. Not at first. She was quite right. And what did her brother say? Nurse said he went with you." "Yes. We called for him, and he went with us, with a flower in his button-hole--a rose it was. He gave me one too." Harry looked at his button-hole, as if expecting to see the rose still in it. But that sign of merry-making was absent. Lady Louisa had on a previous occasion severely reprimanded Nurse for taking Harry to tea at her brother's house, a solicitor's clerk in Ipswich. Her spirits rose. She had detected her in an act of flagrant disobedience. And as likely as not they had all gone to a play together. "Capital!" she said suavely. "He was just the right person to go with. That was what I said to Nurse. And what did _he_ talk about?" "He said, 'Mum's the word. Keep it all quiet till the old cat dies,' and he slapped me on the back and said, 'Mind that, brother-in-law.' He was very nice indeed." A purple mark like a bruise came to Lady Louisa's clay-coloured cheeks. There was a long pause before she spoke again. "And did you write your name nicely, like Janey taught you?" She spoke with long-drawn gasps, each word articulated with difficulty. "Yes," said Harry anxiously, awed by the fixity of her eyes upon him. "I did indeed, mamma. I was very particular." "Your full name?" "Yes, the man said my full name--Henry de la Pole Manvers." "That was the man at the registry office?" "Yes." "And"--the voice laboured heavily and was barely audible--"did Nurse write her name nicely too?" "Yes, and her brother and the man. We all wrote them, and then we all had tea at Frobisher's,--only it wasn't tea,--and Nurse's brother ordered a bottle of champagne. Nurse didn't want him to, but he said people didn't get married every day. And he drank our health, and I drank a little tiny sip, and it made me sneeze." Lady Louisa lay quite motionless, the sweat upon her forehead, looking at her son, who smiled seraphically back at her. And so Nurse had actually thought she could outwit _her_--had pitted herself against _her_? She would shortly learn a thing or two on that head. A great cold was invading her. And as she looked at Harry, it was as if some key, some master key, were suddenly and noiselessly turned in the lock. Without moving her eyes, she saw beyond him the door, expecting to see the handle turn, and Nurse or Janey to come in. But the door remained motionless. Nevertheless, a key somewhere had turned. Everything was locked tight--the room, the walls, the bed, herself in it--as in a vice. "Go back to your lessons," she said to Harry, "and send Janey to me." She felt a sudden imperative need of Janey. But Harry, so docile, so schooled to obedience, made no motion to obey her. He only looked vacantly, expectantly at her.