the fireplace was a looking-glass that made you look much uglier
than you really were, however plain you might be to begin with.
Then there was a mantelboard with maroon plush and wool fringe
that did not match the plush; a dreary clock like a black marble
tomb--it was silent as the grave too, for it had long since
forgotten how to tick. And there were painted glass vases that
never had any flowers in, and a painted tambourine that no one
ever played, and painted brackets with nothing on them.

'And maple-framed engravings of the Queen, the Houses of
Parliament, the Plains of Heaven, and of a blunt-nosed
woodman's flat return.'

There were two books--last December's Bradshaw, and an odd volume
of Plumridge's Commentary on Thessalonians. There were--but I
cannot dwell longer on this painful picture. It was indeed, as
Jane said, very different.

'Let's have a palaver,' said Anthea again.

'What about?' said Cyril, yawning.

'There's nothing to have ANYTHING about,' said Robert kicking the
leg of the table miserably.

'I don't want to play,' said Jane, and her tone was grumpy.

Anthea tried very hard not to be cross. She succeeded.

'Look here,' she said, 'don't think I want to be preachy or a