She went, as she had done so many, many times, to the Mirror over the fireplace to tidy herself. Why! the Mirror was not there! Of course not—that was why the room seemed so changed. She looked around her, smiled a little. A fine girl, anyone seeing her there would have thought her. Marriage had given her an assurance, a self-reliance. She had shrunk back before because she had been afraid of what life would be. Now, when it seemed to her that she had penetrated into the very darkest fastnesses of its secrets, when she felt that nothing in the future could surprise her ever again, she shrank back no longer. Her clothes were better than in the old days, but even now they did not fit her very perfectly. She was still, in her heart, exactly the same rather grave, rather slow, very loving Katherine. She would be stout in later years; there were already little dimples in her cheeks. Her eyes were soft and mild, as they had ever been. The door opened, and Mrs. Trenchard entered. She had expected some caller, and she came forward a few steps with the smile of the hostess upon her lips. Then she saw her daughter, and stopped. Katherine had risen, and stood facing her mother. With a swift consternation, as though someone had shouted some terrifying news into her ear, she realised that her mother was a stranger to her. She had imagined many, many times what this interview would be. She had often considered the things that she would say and the very words in which she would arrange her sentences. But always in her thoughts she had had a certain picture of her mother before her. She had seen an old woman, old as she had been on that night when she had slept in Katherine’s arms, old as she had been at that moment when Katherine had first told her of her engagement to Philip. And now she thought this old woman would face her, maintaining her pride but nevertheless ready, after the separation of these weeks, to break down before the vision of Katherine’s own submission. Katherine had always thought: “Dear Mother. We _must_ have one another. She’ll feel that now. She’ll see that I’m exactly the same....” How different from her dreams was this figure. Her mother seemed to-day younger than Katherine had ever known her. She stood there, tall, stern, straight, the solidity of her body impenetrable, inaccessible to all tenderness, scornful of all embraces. She was young, yes, and stronger. At the first sight of Katherine she had moved back as though she would leave the room. Then she stayed by the door. She was perfectly composed. “Why have you come?” she said. At the cold indifference of that voice Katherine felt a little pulse of anger beat, far away, in the very heart of her tenderness. She moved forward with a little gesture. “Mother, I had to come. It’s Grandfather’s birthday. I couldn’t believe that after all these weeks you wouldn’t be willing to see me.” She stopped. Her mother said nothing.