"How shall you go?" she asked.

"Volor. I shall catch the eighteen o'clock at Blackfriars; the meeting
is at nineteen, and I shall be back at twenty-one."

He addressed himself vigorously to his _entree_, and his mother looked
up with a patient, old-woman smile.

Mabel began to drum her fingers softly on the damask.

"Please make haste, my dear," she said; "I have to be at Brighton at
three."

Oliver gulped his last mouthful, pushed his plate over the line, glanced
to see if all plates were there, and then put his hand beneath the
table.

Instantly, without a sound, the centre-piece vanished, and the three
waited unconcernedly while the clink of dishes came from beneath.

Old Mrs. Brand was a hale-looking old lady, rosy and wrinkled, with the
mantilla head-dress of fifty years ago; but she, too, looked a little
depressed this morning. The _entree_ was not very successful, she
thought; the new food-stuff was not up to the old, it was a trifle
gritty: she would see about it afterwards. There was a clink, a soft
sound like a push, and the centre-piece snapped into its place, bearing
an admirable imitation of a roasted fowl.

Oliver and his wife were alone again for a minute or two after breakfast
before Mabel started down the path to catch the 14-1/2 o'clock 4th grade