"He's got to go," she said, tight-lipped and trembling. "That's flat. You know what I been through with his father, Mr. Trupp. You're the only one as does. I'm not going through it again with him. Ned's my man, and I'm going to see him through. But Ern must go his own way. Stew in his own juice, as Alf says. They say I've been hard with the boy. So I have. Because I've seen it a-comin ever since he was so high. And I've fought it and been beaten." The gruff man was wonderfully tender with her. He saw the woman's distress and understood its cause as no other could have done. "Don't do anything in a hurry," he said soothingly. "Think it over for a week and then come and see me again." That evening he reported the interview to his wife. "She'll never turn him out!" cried the kind woman. "She will though," said Mr. Trupp. Mrs. Trupp, pink and white with indignation, dropped her eyes to her work to hide the flash in them. "I'll never forgive her if she does," she said. "Yes, you will," retorted Mr. Trupp. Mrs. Trupp answered nothing for a time. "I shall go round to see her," she said at last with determination. "You won't move her," the Doctor answered, grimly cheerful. "No," said Mrs. Trupp. "She hasn't got a heart. As Mr. Pigott says, she's hard as the nether millstone in a frost." Mr. Trupp put down his coffee-cup and licked his lips like a cat. "My dear," he said, "you haven't been through her mill." "Perhaps not," the other answered warmly. "But I am a mother." The sympathetic creature, all love and pity, was as good as her word. Mrs. Trupp was always full of indignation against Mrs. Caspar when away from her, and in her presence touched by the tragedy of the woman's loneliness. She found things at Rectory Walk as she had expected or worse. Ern had lost his job. His escapade at the Rink had reached his employers' ears. None too satisfied with the quality of the lad's work, they had seized the excuse to dismiss him. "There he is!" cried Mrs. Caspar. "Just turn eighteen and back on my hands. Nobody won't have him, and I don't blame em neether." "Where is he?" asked Mrs. Trupp. The interview between the two women was taking place in the back sitting-room, where Mrs. Caspar always saw her rare visitors. Anne nodded in the direction of the study. "Settin along o dad," she said briefly. "Nothing but trouble along of it all. I took his cigarettes away. _If he don't earn neether shan't he smoke_, as Alf says. And now dad won't smoke because Ern can't. _Sympathetic strike_, Alf calls it. And it's dad's one pleasure. I allow him a shilling bacca-money a week. It's just all I do allow him." "We all make mistakes--especially when we're young," said Mrs. Trupp gently. The other was adamant. "There's slips and slips," she retorted. "If he'd gone with a girl I'd have said nothing. But _this_!" Mrs. Trupp was steadfast in her tranquil way, as her opponent was dogged.