"My own way! So one talks. What is one's way? The way one would choose? No--it's generally the way one has to tread. It's in that sense that I shall get my own way." "You'll try for it in the other sense, though, I fancy." "Yes, perhaps I shall--and I shan't try less because Lord Fillingford and the Aspenicks either scold or pet me." "Well, but it's hardly reasonable to expect to have things both ways, is it?" She came to me, laughing, and took hold of my hands: "But if I choose to have them both ways, sir?" she asked. "Then, of course," said I, "the case is different." "I will have them both ways," said Jenny. "You can't." "See if I don't!" she cried in merry defiance. "Only, mind you, not a word of it--to the county!" She pressed my hands and let them go. "Oh, I'm so tired!" "Stop thinking--do stop thinking--and go to sleep." She nodded at me kindly and reassuringly as Loft came in to put out the lights. I left her standing there in her rich frock, with her jewels gleaming, yet with her eyes again weary and mournful. She had had a bad day of it, for all her triumph in the evening. Trying to have it both ways was hard work. CHAPTER IX THE INSTITUTE CLERK Mr. Bindlecombe was jubilant. Jenny's vacillations were over--the Institute was really on the way. A Provisional Committee had been formed; it was composed of Bindlecombe (in the Chair, in virtue of his office of Mayor, which he still held), Fillingford, Cartmell, Alison the Rector of the old parish church, and Jenny. I was what I believe they term in business circles "alternate" with--or to?--Jenny; when she could not attend, I was to act and, if need be, vote in her place. As a fact, I generally went even when she did. Since the Institute was to serve for women as well as for men, a subsidiary and advisory Ladies' Committee was formed--and Lady Sarah Lacey was induced to accept the chairmanship of it. Jenny was justifiably proud of this triumph; but the Ladies' Committee had nothing to do with finance, and finance was, of course, the question of paramount interest, in the early stages at least. The original ten thousand pounds which I had allocated to the Memorial Hall looked a mere trifle now. The talk was of eighty thousand--with a hundred thousand for a top limit. Over these figures Cartmell looked important, but not outraged--evidently the Driver estate was shaping well. But it was, as Jenny remarked, impossible to be precise on the subject of figures, until we had more definite ideas about what we wanted to do. Plans were, she declared, the first necessity--provisional plans, at all events--and she was for having them drawn up at once. Bindlecombe was in no way reluctant, but opined that plans depended largely on site; must not the question of site be taken in hand simultaneously? Jenny replied that Mr. Bindlecombe had so convinced her of the unique suitability of Hatcham Ford that she was in negotiation with Mr. Octon.