"Shut up!" ordered Joan. "Who cares whether you've got a hundred and fifty a year or not? Besides, anyhow, you're only a kid; you won't be allowed to spend it now." "It isn't now," said Milly thoughtfully. "It's afterwards that I care about." Mrs. Ogden ignored her younger daughter. What did it matter what Milly felt or thought? She groped for Joan's hand and squeezed it. "I think I ought to tell you," she said gravely, "that your father is very much upset at this news; he's very much hurt by what your aunt has done. I can understand and sympathize with his feelings. You see he knows that he has always been a good father to you, and it would have been more seemly had this money been left to him, though, of course, your father and I have control of it until you each become twenty-one years old or get married." Something prompted her to make the situation quite clear to her children. She had another motive for telling them, or at all events for telling Joan, exactly how things stood; she wanted to know the worst at once. She knew anything would be more endurable than uncertainty as to how this legacy would affect Joan. The children were silent; something awkward in the situation impressed them; they longed to be alone to talk it over. Mrs. Ogden left the room to interview the cook; she had had her say, and she felt now that she could only await results. 3 As the door closed behind her they stared at each other incredulously. Joan was the first to speak. "What an extraordinary thing!" she said. Milly frowned. "You are queer; I don't believe you're really pleased. I believe you're almost sorry." "I don't know quite what I am," Joan admitted. "It seems to worry Mother, though I don't see why it should; but I have a feeling that that's going to spoil it." "Oh, you always find something to spoil everything. Why should it worry Mother? It doesn't worry me; I think we're jolly lucky. I know what I'm going to do, I'm going to talk to Doddsie this very day about going to the Royal College of Music." Joan scented trouble. Would Milly's little violin master side with her when he knew of his pupil's future independence? "You'd better look out," she warned. "You talk as though you had the money now. Father won't agree to your going up to London, and anyhow you're much too young. For goodness' sake go slow; one gets so sick of rows!" Milly smiled quietly; she felt that it was no good arguing with Joan; Joan was always apprehensive and on the look-out for trouble. Milly knew what she wanted to do and she intended to do it; after all, she reckoned, she wouldn't remain thirteen years old for ever, and when the time came for her to go to London to London she meant to go, so there was no good fussing. A glow of satisfaction and gratitude began to creep over her; she thought almost tenderly of Aunt Henrietta. "Poor Aunt Henrietta!" she remarked in a sympathetic voice. "I hope it didn't hurt her--the dying, I mean."