"What was it, M'riar? Don't you bottle it up." "Why, Mr. Jeffcoat he said, after passing the time of day, round in Clove Street, 'I look to Mr. Wardle to keep up the character of The Sun,' he said. So you bear in mind, Mo." Whereupon Uncle Mo departed, and Aunt M'riar was left to her own reflections, the children being abed and asleep by now; Dolly certainly, probably Dave. Presently the door to the street was pushed open, and Mr. Jerry appeared. "I don't see no Moses?" said he. Aunt M'riar gave her message, over her shoulder. To justify this she should have been engaged on some particular task of the needle, easiest performed when seated. Mr. Alibone, to whom her voice sounded unusual, looked round to see. He only saw that her hands were in her lap, and no sign was visible of their employment. This was unlike his experience of Aunt M'riar. "Find the weather trying, Mrs. Wardle?" "It don't do me any harm." "Ah--some feels the heat more than others." Aunt M'riar roused herself to reply:--"If you're meaning me, Mr. Alibone, it don't touch me so much as many. Only my bones are not so young as they were--that's how it came I was sitting down. Now, supposin' you'd happened in five minutes later, you might have found me tidin' up. I've plenty to do yet awhile." But this was not convincing, although the speaker wished to make it so; probably it would have been better had less effort gone to the utterance of it. For Aunt M'riar's was too obvious. Mr. Jerry laughed cheerfully, for consolation. "Come now, Aunt M'riar," said he, "_you_ ain't the one to talk as if you was forty, and be making mention of your bones. Just you let them alone for another fifteen year. That'll be time." Mr. Jerry had been like one of the family, so pleasantry of this sort was warranted. It was not unwelcome to Aunt M'riar. "I'm forty-six, Mr. Jerry," she said. "And forty-six is six-and-forty." "And fifty-six is six-and-fifty, which is what I am, this very next Michaelmas. Now I call that a coincidence, Mrs. Wardle." Aunt M'riar reflected. "I should have said it was an accident, Mr. Jerry. Like anythin' else, as the sayin' is. You mention to Mo, not to be late, no more than need be. Not to throw away good bedtime!" Mr. Jerry promised to impress the advantages of early hours, and went his way. But his reflections on his short interview with Aunt M'riar took the form of asking himself what had got her, and finding no answer to the question. Something evidently had, from her manner, for there was nothing in what she said. He asked the same question of Uncle Mo, coming away from The Sun, where they did not wait for the very last tune on the piano, to the disgust of Mr. Jeffcoat, the proprietor. "What's got Aunt M'riar?" said Uncle Mo, repeating his words. "Nothin's got Aunt M'riar. She'd up and tell me fast enough if there was anything wrong. What's put you on that lay, Jerry?"