"If you did anything of the sort, I should take poison," Mrs. Cary declared. "No, you wouldn't. We should move on to another continent, and try our luck there, that's all. It's the very futility of truth-telling which prevents me from experimenting in that direction. Perhaps, as you suggest, Mr. Travers will take the task from my shoulders." Mrs. Cary rose to her feet and came ponderously over to her daughter's side. Her voice, when she spoke, was troubled with genuine emotion. "Beatrice," she said, "I don't ask respect of you--I don't suppose it would be any sort of good if I did. You haven't any respect in you. But at any rate have some consideration for me. You needn't make my life worse than it is. It's no use your saying to me, 'Give up the money, and hide your head.' I can't. I never could hide my head, and at the bottom _I_ don't believe you could either. It's the way we are made. Ever since I was a little child, and played about in my father's shop, I wanted people to bow down to me and respect me. I meant that one day they should. When I married they did--for a time at least. When the crash came, and--and all the shame, I just ran away from it. I couldn't have done anything else. Ever since then I have been trying to build things up elsewhere, and I had to have money for it. You can't blame me, Beatrice. You aren't any better. You always want to be first in your singing and your painting, you always want the best of what's going. You always want to be admired and successful in everything you do. You take after me in that." A note of curious pride crept into her voice. "So it's just like this, Beatrice--I can't live without position. I may not take poison, but I shall die all the same if I can't play a part in the world. All I ask is that you help me all you can. It's not much. I've been a pretty decent mother to you. You can't say that there was ever a time when I grudged you a pretty frock or a dance--" She stopped in her long speech, yielding to Beatrice's irrepressible gesture of impatience. "You needn't have gone into so much explanation," the girl said, fastening a small diamond pendant round her white neck. "I know you and I know myself. As to my gratitude, I am fully aware of what I owe you, and am ready to pay. What do you want me to do?" "Don't go against me." "I haven't done so yet. I don't mean to. As far as I can recollect, I've pulled us both out of as many scrapes as you have landed us into," Beatrice replied. "I know. That's why I want you to do your best now." "To do what?" "To keep Marut tolerable for us." "I can't prevent Mr. Travers gossiping if he wants to." A smile flitted over Mrs. Cary's fat face, robbing it of its good-nature and leaving it merely vulgarly cunning. "You could if you wanted to." "How?" "Oh, you know! You have a way with men. You could shut his mouth." Beatrice laughed outright.