She was conscious, during the afternoon, of some injustice; she had been treated badly. At dinner that night Rocket forgot the footstool that was essential to her comfort; she was compelled at last to ask him for it. He had never forgotten it before; they all thought her an old woman who didn’t matter; no one troubled now about her—well, they should see.... Great Aunt Sarah was, as often happened to her, rheumatic but Spartan in bed. The ladies, when they left the dining-room and closed around the drawing-room fire, were Mrs. Trenchard, Aunt Aggie, Aunt Betty, Katherine and Millie. Happy and comfortable enough they looked, with the shadowed dusky room behind them and the blaze in front of them. In the world outside it was a night of intense frost: here they were reflected in the Mirror, Mrs. Trenchard’s large gold locket (Henry as a baby inside it), Aggie’s plump neck and black silk dress, Aunt Betty’s darting, sparkling eyes, Millie’s lovely shoulders, Katherine’s rather dumpy ones—there they all were, right inside the Mirror, with a reflected fire to make them cosy and the walls ever so thick and old. The freezing night could not touch them. “Rocket’s getting very old and careless,” said Aggie. Everyone had known that Aunt Aggie was out of temper this evening, and everyone, therefore, was prepared for a tiresome hour or two. Rocket was a great favourite; Mrs. Trenchard, her arms folded across her bosom, her face the picture of placid content, said: “Oh, Aggie, do you think so?... I don’t.” “No, of course, you don’t, Harriet,” answered her sister sharply. “He takes care with you. Of course he does. But if you considered your sister sometimes—” “My dear Aggie!” Mrs. Trenchard, as she spoke, bent forward and very quietly picked up a bright green silk thread from the carpet. “Oh, I’m not complaining! That’s a thing I don’t believe in! After all, if you think Rocket’s perfection I’ve no more to say. I want others to be comfortable—for myself I care nothing. It is for the rest of the family.” “We’re _quite_ comfortable, Aunt Aggie, thank you,” said Millie laughing. “I hope you don’t think, Harriet,” said Aggie, disregarding her niece, “that I’m complaining—I—” Mrs. Trenchard leant towards her, holding out the thread of green silk! “That must be from your silks, Aggie dear,” she said. “It’s just the colour of your parrot’s tail. I couldn’t think what it was, lying there on the carpet.” It was then that Katherine, who had paid no attention to this little conversation but had followed her own thoughts, said: “Oh! how careless of me! I never took Henry’s book, after all—and I went right up Oxford Street too!” This was unfortunate, because it reminded Aunt Aggie of something that she had very nearly forgotten. Of course Katherine had never intended to take the book—she had simply offered to do so because she thought her Aunt old, feeble, and incapable.