Complete Project Gutenberg John

ys House, London. She climbed slowly, in the very middle, an extremely small white figure on those wide and shining stairs, countin

overing what was at the end of the picture gallery absorbed the whole of her essentially practical and active mind. Deciding on the left-hand flight of stairs, she entered that immensely long, narrow, and-with blinds drawn-rather dark saloon. She walked carefully, because the floor was very slippery here, and with a kind of seriousness due partly to the darkness and partly to the pictures. They were indeed, in this light, rather formidable, those old Caradocs black, armoured creatures, some of them, who seemed to eye with a sort of burning, grim, defensive greed the small white figure of their descendant passing along between them. But little Ann, who knew they were only pictures, maintained her course steadily, and every now and then, as she passed one who seemed to her rather uglier than the others, wrinkled her sudden little nose. At the end, as she had thought; appeared a door. She opened it, and passed on to a landing.

ere you sit

t

Granny? Where does the

of of the

ive a message, s

to lo

good

, Lord and Lady Valleys looked a

ich she had interrupted

cial study where he was always liable to the attacks of secretaries, Lord

mself, and had now come to him for final decision. The question affected two villages to the north of the property,

tials, the matter stood thus: Apart from that particular quarry the Pendridny estate was not only a going, but even a profitable concern, supporting itself and supplying some of the sinews of war towards Valleys House and

e than deterred him from it. He felt as if he were being dictated to in advance, and he did not like dictation. To have to deprive these poor people of their immediate living was, he knew, a good deal more irksome to him than to those who would certainly make a fuss about it, his conscience was clear, and he could discount that future outcry as mere Party spite. He had ve

t must therefore be false economics and a secret sort of socialism. Further, if logically followed out, it might end in my ruin, and to allow that, though I might not personally objec

e question, his mind, or rather perhaps, his essential se

d enough to put to himself, sooner than have it put by anyone else, that it was disproportionate for a single man by a stroke of the pen to be able to dispose of the livelihood of hundreds whose senses and feelings were similar to his own-he had answered:

e decision made him sorry, for if he had no gr

small figures when his wife entered. Though she had come to ask his advic

he matter

, deliberately tapped out his pipe, t

! Nothing fo

eys' face

l mean such dre

ails. "It's putting a drag o

should never be able to go down there. And

d on his nails that slow, thought-f

ooner Pendridny were let than throw all thos

dcock shooting

ursuing her tho

ple drafted into other things

shortly, "and don't mean

to know what he

un's no good in a matter of this sort-he an

er, and took him by th

to please me; s

aring at her for some ti

'll leave it ove

at's better t

r there. Time enough to come to that if w

flushed, bent forwa

oment that littl

y had exchanged that dubio

on't know what to make

ting her hear

answered al

of his easy-going parentalism, he disliked the thought

Valleys slowly,

o you

by no means certain she hasn't got som

lleys, growing most

act

Miltoun's business was q

Lady Valleys. "I'm watc

, they

tered Lord Valleys. "Really, it's too much

eyebrows. Men were very

and worse t

eting. I'll take her, and see if I ca

ork. Not that there was any academic consistency about her in the matter, for in private life amongst her friends she was not narrowly dogmatic on the duty of wives to multiply exceedingly. She thought imperially on the subject, without bigotry. Large, healthy families, in all cases save individual ones! The prime idea at the back of her mind was-National Expansion! Her motto, and she intended if possible to make it the motto of the League, was: 'D

arbara into conversation. That must wait. The child, though languid, and pale, was

he Committee were already assembled, an