“Put that down,” Mrs. Bishop had said; and the item of capital outlay had gone down on a half-sheet of note-paper.

To Cailsham they had brought with them an old armchair convertible, at considerable risk to the fingers, into a shake-down bed.

“We needn’t buy a bed, then,” said Mrs. Bishop.

“No; but it’ll need some sort of coverlet to make it look decent.  I’ve seen them at Robinson’s in the High Street for two and eleven-three.”

“Put that down,” said Mrs. Bishop.

By ten o’clock the list of expenses had been compiled.  By eleven o’clock it was decided what would be the cost of board and lodging for an adult—­a little being added on to that for visionary extras—­soap, light, towels, and suchlike, less visionary than others, but extras nevertheless.

When Mallins, the constable on night duty, passed down Wyatt Street at quarter-past eleven and saw a light in No. 17, he stopped in amazement and gazed through a chink in the old Venetian blind.

“It’s ’ard on that Mrs. Bishop,” he said to his wife the next morning, “the way she ’as to work.”

That same morning a letter had been despatched to Mrs. Priestly, and by return of post came the reply—­

“I suppose what you ask is quite reasonable.  I am bringing Maurice to you the day after to-morrow.”

“Suppose!” said Elsie.

“We couldn’t do it for less,” said Mrs. Bishop.

“And the box room’ll look really quite comfortable,” Dora joined in.  “I’ve just put the bed up.  I never thought it was such a nice little room.”

Two days afterwards Mrs. Priestly and little Maurice had made their appearance.  The slowest of the three flies in the town of Cailsham drove them up to the door and, for the moment, all work in the schoolroom had been suspended.  The twenty sons of gentlemen, left to themselves, behaved as the sons of gentlemen—­of any men, in fact-will do.  There was an uproar in the schoolroom which Dora, before she had obtained a proper view of Mrs. Priestly from behind the door of the pantry at the end of the long hall, was compelled to go and reduce to silence.  Having been deprived of the gratification of her curiosity, her effort had been with unqualified success.  Between the ages of four and eight a boy can be quelled by a look.  That look, the twenty sons of gentlemen received.

Mrs. Priestly was a tall woman, graceful and, for one who lived in one of the smaller of the provincial towns, elegantly dressed.  Her face and its expression were sad.  The quietness of her manner and the gentle reserve of her voice added to that sadness.  The patient gaze of her deep grey eyes suggested suffering.  Undoubtedly she had suffered.  To the sympathetic observer, this would have been obvious; but to the calculating mind of Mrs. Bishop it presented itself in the form of a social aloofness which she was morbidly quick to see in any one.

Mrs. Priestly was dark.  Little Maurice was fair—­the Saxon stamped on his head, coloured in his blue eyes.  He was six years old, abundant in extreme animal spirits, which his mother beheld with a love and pride in her eyes that was almost pathetic to see in one so possessed by the apathy of unhappiness, and which Mrs. Bishop observed with the silent resolve that Master Maurice was on no account to be allowed into her drawing-room.