This last word Virginia interpreted "ruined," and as she plodded along the High Street, and up the Balchurch Road, past Sycamore Terrace and its handsome houses, to the region of tiny villas, these words were haunting her. She had supposed their ruin already accomplished. What could have happened afresh? What had mamma been doing? Incurring debts which she could not pay? This she was constantly doing upon a small scale, in spite of the fact that her daughter rigorously supervised her cheque-book and controlled the household expenditure. Virginia took it for granted that her mother would always spend more than she ought, and was quite used to depriving herself of necessaries in order to provide mamma with such small luxuries as expensive soap, note-paper, perfume, a library subscription, and so on. Graver expenditure than this she had not anticipated; but she was blaming herself for having yielded to the imploring desire of Mims that she should go to London, and her mother's eager advocacy of the plan. She ought not to have left mamma to the management of anything; she knew it. She was prepared to find the weekly expenses doubled, but she had still a couple of sovereigns in her purse with which she hoped to meet this deficiency. As she moved along in the heat, laden and depressed, her face assumed an aspect of anxiety which altered it surprisingly. Seen thus, it was obvious that she was not merely slender, but sadly thin: hollows were discernible in the cheeks, shadows lurked around the smiling mouth when it was grave. At last Laburnum Villa was reached. With a sigh of relief Virginia trod the tiny garden approach, pushed open the narrow door, and deposited her burdens within the passage. The passage was extremely small. It was distempered in pale green (Virginia had distempered it), and the paint was white (Virginia had enamelled it). The floor was stained (Virginia had stained it), and on the ground there lay a very valuable old Persian corridor-rug, relic of Lissendean. From Lissendean, too, came the marble fountain-head which was used for umbrellas, and the little carved oak table. Cinderella's expression changed as she entered her home--changed to an eager, glowing delight of anticipation. Light-footed she ran up the tiny staircase, and, pushing open the door of the back room on the landing, flew to the side of a child who lay almost flat upon an invalid-couch at the open window. There were ecstatic cries: "Virgie, Virgie!" and "Pansy, my Pansy blossom!" and the two sisters were clinging together in a rapture of affection. "Let's look at you, Virgie, darling! Oh, yes, you are better! It has done you good, hasn't it, dear? Plenty to eat--you never have enough at home." "Pansy, Pansy, what nonsense you talk, you silly baby! Of course I always have plenty to eat! The point is, how have _you_ been getting on? Has old Mrs. Brown fed you properly?"