"Well, well, my dear," said the Major, "I know you have all the trouble of the household, but I meant to say that if you had any pursuit, any study----" "And as to visitors," continued Aunt Theresa, who always pursued her own train of ideas, irrespective of replies, "I'm sure society's no pleasure to me; I only call on the people you ought to call on, and keep up a few acquaintances for the children's sake. You wouldn't have us without a friend in the world when the girls come out; and really, what with regimental duties in the morning, and insects afterwards, Edward, you are so absorbed, that if it wasn't for a lady friend coming in now and then, I should hardly have a soul to speak to." The Major was melted in a moment. "I am afraid I am a very inattentive husband," he said. "You must forgive me, my dear. And this sprained ankle keeping me in makes me cross, too. And I had so reckoned on these days at home to finish my list of Coleoptera, and get some dissecting and mounting done. But to-day, Mrs. Minchin brought her work directly after breakfast, and that empty-headed fellow Elliott dropped in for lunch, and we had callers all the afternoon, and a _coterie_ for tea, and Mrs. St. John (who seems to get through life somehow without the most indefinite notion of how time passes) came in just when tea was over, and you had to order a fresh supply when we should have been dressing for dinner, and the dinner was spoilt by waiting till she discovered that she had no idea (whoever did know her have an idea?) how late it was, and that Mr. St. John would be so angry. And now you want me to go in a cab to a concert at the Rooms to meet all these people over again!" "I'm sure I don't care for Mrs. St. John a bit more than you do," said Mrs. Buller. "And really she does repeat such things sometimes--without ever looking round to see if the girls are in the room. She told me a thing to-day that old Lady Watford had told her." "My dear, her ladyship's stories are well known. Cremorne's wife hears them from her, and tells them to her husband, and he tells them to the other fellows. I can always hear them if I wish. But I do not care to. But if you don't like Mrs. St. John, Theresa, what on earth made you ask her to come and sit with you in the morning?" "Well, my dear, what can I do?" said Mrs. Buller. "She's always saying that everybody is so unsociable, and that she is so dull, she doesn't know what to do with herself, and begging me to take my work and go and sit with her in a morning. How can I go and leave the children and the servants, just at the time of day when everything wants to be set going? So I thought I'd better ask her to come here instead. It's a great bore, but I can keep an eye over the house, and if any one else drops in I can leave them together. It's not me that she wants, it's something to amuse her.