What made things worse was that Martin, the beloved twin, with whom disagreement was a thing unthinkable, radically disapproved of what she was doing, and his disapproval, she was afraid, was terribly practical,--namely, that it was quite certainly no use. Two things, however, after some three weeks of what seemed fruitless endeavour, kept her to it. One was a letter from Aunt Susan, to whom she had sent a despairing sheet, containing a memorable sentence: “God does not always pay on Saturday, Helen,” she had said. The other was an innate pride that forbade her to accept defeat. Here she feared also to lose the respect not only of her father, but of Frank. “Yes, my darling, you tried it,” she imagined him saying, “and you found it was doing no good.” And that he should say that was somehow intolerable to her. Whatever she might be, she would not be feeble. “The lame and the blind that are hated of David’s soul” seemed to her a very legitimate object of detestation. She would not give a thing up because she mistrusted her power of doing it. Thus her apparent failure consumed itself. With the divine confidence of youth, the less successful she seemed to be the more she spurred herself on to strive. All her sense of right had told her, when she made her decision, that she would thus be doing her best; her judgment was arrived at coolly and sanely, and the present practical ill-success of it argued nothing against the principle. Then came a crowning despondency and agitation in something Martin told her after he returned from a visit to Lady Sunningdale. The short history of that visit, however, claims an episodic precedence. * * * * * Lady Sunningdale had sent her motor over from Fareham to fetch Martin, and when he arrived, about tea-time, he rushed straight out on to the lawn to find her, but only encountered the chilling looks of several total strangers who were talking about fiscal problems and seemed surprised, if not pained, to see him. This was discouraging; and he was wondering what place there was to flee unto, when a footman came out after him to say that her ladyship was in her bedroom and wished to see him there immediately. Martin could not help giving a little giggle of amusement at this, and the footman, preceding him upstairs, threw open the door and announced him. The room was large and very rose-coloured, on the principle of Lady Sunningdale’s famous maxim that bedrooms should be optimistic. She herself was reclining on the optimistic silk coverlet of her bed, with her shoes off and the blinds down.