"Yes," he said curtly, wondering what on earth had made her ask him that. "It's killing her then--not having them?" "That," he said, "and the desire to have them." "How cruel it is, how detestable--that she should have _this_----" "It's Nature's revenge, Jane, on herself." "And she was so sweet, she would have loved them----" The Doctor brooded. He had a thing to say to her. "Jinny, if you'd put it away--altogether--that writing of yours--you'd be a different woman." "Different?" "You'd be happier. And, what's more, you'd be well, too. Perfectly well." "This is not the advice I should give you," he went on, addressing her silence, "if you were an unmarried woman. I urge my unmarried patients to work--to use their brains all they can--and married ones, too, when they've no children. If poor Mabel had done _something_ it would have been far better. But in your case it's disastrous." Jane remained silent. She herself had a premonition of disaster. Her restlessness was on her. Her nerves and blood were troubled again by the ungovernable, tyrannous impulse of her power. It was not the year she should have chosen, but because she had no choice she was working through everything, secretly, in defiance of Henry's orders. She wondered if he knew. He was looking at her keenly, as if he had at any rate a shrewd suspicion. "I hardly think," he said, "it's fair to Hugh." Henry was sure of his facts, and her silence made him surer. She _was_ at it again, and the question was how to stop her? The question was laid that night before the family committee. It met in the library at Moor Grange almost by Brodrick's invitation. Brodrick was worried. He had gone so far as to confess that he was worried about Jane. She wanted to write another book, he said, and he didn't know whether she was fit. "Of course she isn't fit," said the Doctor. "It must be stopped. She must be made to give it up--altogether." Brodrick inquired who was to make her? and was told that _he_ was. He must put his foot down. He should have put it down before. But Brodrick, being a Brodrick, took an unexpected line. "I don't know," he said slowly, "that we've any right to dictate to her. It's a big question, and I think she ought to be allowed to decide it for herself." "She isn't fit," said Henry, "to decide anything for herself." Brodrick sent a level look at him. "You talk," said he, "as if she wasn't responsible." "I should be very sorry to say who is and who isn't. Responsibility is a question of degree. I say Jane is not at the present moment in a state to decide." "It sounds," said Brodrick, laughing in his bitterness, "very much as if you thought she wasn't sane. Of course I know she'd put a cheque for a hundred pounds into a drawer and forget all about it. But it would be more proof of insanity in Jinny if she remembered it was there." "It would indeed," said Sophy. "We're not discussing Jinny's talent for finance," said Henry.