Grace smiled as Mrs. Osborn got up with a disturbed look.  “Mother cannot have much to give and I have nothing at all.  I’m afraid Gerald’s talent for begging will be used in vain.”

She went out with Mrs. Osborn and when they had gone Osborn, crossing the floor to the sideboard, filled his glass to the top.  This was his regular habit and its futility escaped him, although he knew his wife and daughter knew.  He felt he did enough if he exercised some self-denial when they were about.

In the meantime, Mrs. Osborn sat down on the terrace and looked across the untidy lawn.

“We need a new pony mower; Jenkins cannot keep the grass in order with the small machine.  He was very obstinate about the bedding plants he wanted to buy and the borders look thin, but I felt I must be firm,” she said and added drearily:  “I wonder when we shall be forced to get a sporting tenant and live in a smaller house.”

“Father would not leave Tarnside.  I suppose you don’t know how things are really going?”

“I know they are not going well and suspect they get worse; but he will not tell me.  One could help if one did know.”

“I’m afraid I have disappointed father and given you anxieties you need not have had,” Grace replied with some bitterness.  “After all, however, the fault is hardly mine.  I wanted to make my own career, but was not allowed; to work at a useful occupation, would somehow have humiliated our ridiculous pride, and there was, of course, only one hope left for you.”  She paused, and colored as she resumed:  “Well, although I am not sorry, it looks as if that hope had gone.”

“It would have been a relief if you had made a good marriage,” Mrs. Osborn admitted.  “Still, since you met nobody you like—­”

“The men I might perhaps have liked were poor.  Father would, no doubt, think it my natural perversity, or our bad luck; but I don’t believe in luck.  It’s an excuse for weak makeshifts and futilities; one can conquer bad fortune if one is resolute.”

“None of us, except you, has much resolution,” Mrs. Osborn remarked and sighed.  “So far, your firmness has not helped much; I imagine you know your father has not given up hope.”

“Yes,” said Grace, rather harshly.  “I do know, and that is why I am often impatient.  He will not be persuaded the thing’s impossible.”

“After all, Alan has some advantages.”

“He has many drawbacks,” Grace rejoined, and then her face softened and she gave her mother an appealing look.  “I thought you were on my side!”

“I am on your side where you feel strongly.  Perhaps I am reserved and you do not often give me your confidence.”

“I’m sorry.  We are seldom quite honest at Tarnside; somehow one can’t be oneself, but now we must be frank.  I don’t like Alan Thorn; I never liked him.  It’s impossible.”

“Then, my dear, there is no more to be said.”

Grace made a sign of disagreement.  “There may be much; that is why I am disturbed.  You and I don’t count, mother; we are expected to submit.  It isn’t that I don’t like Alan; I shrink from him.  He is cunning and knows how to wait.  Sometimes his patience frightens me.”