desolate and oppressed; for Maggie's sister, dying of cancer; and for
Mamma, kneeling there, praying.

Sunday after Sunday.

And she would work in the garden every morning, digging in leaf mould and
carrying the big stones for the rockery; she would go to Mrs. Sutcliffe's
sewing parties; she would sit for hours with Maggie's sister, trying not
to look as if she minded the smell of the cancer. You were no good unless
you could do little things like that. You were no good unless you could
keep on doing them.

She tried to keep on.

Some people kept on all day, all their lives. Still, it was not you so
much as the world that was wrong. It wasn't fair and right that Maggie's
sister should have cancer while you had nothing the matter with you. Or
even that Maggie had to cook and scrub while you made poems.

Not fair and right.


X.

"Mamma, what is it? Why are you in the dark?"

By the firelight she could see her mother sitting with her eyes shut, and
her hands folded in her lap.

"I can't use my eyes. I think there must be something the matter with