And Frances was sorry for Mrs. Jervis, who had borne no sons, who had only borne one unattractive and unsatisfactory daughter.  She used to be sorry for her because Rosalind was pink and fat and fluffy; she was sorry for her now because Rosalind was unsatisfactory.  She was sorry for Mrs. Norris because her boy could never grow up like Michael or Nicholas or John.  She was sorry for Mrs. Vereker because George, though he looked all right when he was by himself, became clumsy and common at once beside Michael and Nicholas and John.  George was also in white flannels; he played furiously and well; he played too furiously and too consciously well; he was too damp and too excited; his hair became damp and excited as he played; his cries had a Cockney tang.

Her arrogance nourished itself on these contrasts.

Mrs. Jervis looked wistfully at the young men as they played.  She looked still more wistfully at Dorothy.

“What do you do,” she said, “to keep your children with you?”

“I do nothing,” Frances said.  “I don’t try to keep them.  I’ve never appealed to their feelings for my own purposes, or taken advantage of their affection, that’s all.

“They know that if they want to walk out of the house to-morrow, and stay out, they can.  Nobody’ll stop them.”

There was a challenging, reminiscent glint in Mr. Jervis’s eyes, and his wife was significantly silent.  Frances knew what they were thinking.

“Nicky,” she said, “walked out; but he came back again as soon as he was in trouble.  Michael walks out and goes abroad every year; but he comes back again.  Dorothy walks out, but she’s never dreamed of not coming back again.”

“Of course, if you aren’t afraid of taking risks,” said Mr. Jervis.

“I am afraid.  But I’ve never shown it.”

“It’s very strange that Dorothy hasn’t married.”  Mrs. Jervis spoke.  She derived comfort from the thought that Dorothy was eight-and-twenty and not married.

“Dorothy,” said Frances, “could marry to-morrow if she wanted to; but she doesn’t want.”

She was sorry for her friend, but she really could not allow her that consolation.

“Veronica is growing up very good-looking,” said Mrs. Jervis then.

But it was no use.  Frances was aware that Veronica was grown up, and that she was good-looking, and that Nicky loved her; but Mrs. Jervis’s shafts fell wide of all her vulnerable places.  Frances was no longer afraid.

“Veronica,” she said, “is growing up very good.”  It was not the word she would have chosen, yet it was the only one she could think of as likely to convey to Mrs. Jervis what she wanted her to know, though it left her obtuseness without any sense of Veronica’s mysterious quality.

She herself had never tried to think of a word for it before; she was only driven to it now because she detected in her friend’s tone a challenge and a warning.  It was as if Rosalind’s mother had said, extensively and with pointed reference to the facts:  “Veronica is dangerous.  Her mother has had adventures.  She is grown-up and she is good-looking, and Nicky is susceptible to that sort of thing.  If you don’t look out he will be caught again.  The only difference between Phyllis Desmond and Veronica is in their skins.”