"Oh! Why?"
"I don't know. I wish you'd go to sleep. It's ages till breakfast."
That meal was supposed to be at nine o'clock on Sunday mornings; but Bessie had learnt the folly of preparing it at that hour for the master and mistress of the house, so she lay long in bed, knowing that if the children grew impatient they would raid the larder, and just before the clock struck nine she would hurry down the stairs in her loose felt slippers. At half-past nine Edward Webb would appear, and read yesterday's newspaper until Nancy, lazy and smiling, in her trailing dressing-gown, entered the breakfast-room.
"Oh, did you wait for me?" she would say, and drop into her place behind the teacups.
No one went to church, but for an hour before dinner Edward Webb would take his little daughters for a walk, while Nancy, seated in her rocking-chair, would read her endless novels. Following the indolence of her body, which was the result of more ill-health than anyone but herself suspected, her mind had gradually refused to exercise its natural, homely criticism in literature, and she read greedily, almost mechanically, any novel, not too serious, she could procure. Her method at the circulating library was to work methodically along the shelves, and the attendant, without question, would put the next book into her hands. Often she did not know its name, sometimes she could not have retold the tale. Reading and rocking had become twin habits which were alike soothing and effortless. Meanwhile the mending-basket would be filled to overflowing, and her husband would complain that he could not find a mended pair of socks. Then she would flush all over her rueful face, and, still rocking, she would darn rhythmically until there was no more daylight, when, murmuring something about trying her eyes with dark work, she would pick up her book. But once Theresa, with her sharp nose in the basket and a keen eye for other people's faults, drew forth in triumph a light-coloured garment. "But here's a woolly vest of father's!" she cried. "You can darn that!"
"Oh, can I, Miss Interference? Perhaps you would like to do it yourself. Yes, you shall. It's time you learnt. Get the stool and sit beside me."
Theresa remained there until long past bedtime, and when she had finished the darn there was a deep hole in her middle finger, for she had refused to wear a thimble. She avoided the work-basket in future, and Nancy had not the energy to turn this lesson to further account by making her mend her own stockings, so as often as not there were holes in Theresa's heels; but the inkpot was handy, and she used it freely, foreseeing to what martyrdom more complaints might lead. Grace, who seemed to have gathered into her beautiful body all the commonsense the family could muster, had years ago accepted responsibility for her personal neatness, and her stockings were faultless; it was not lack of mending that wore them out, but the constancy with which she practised her dancing.
On this Sunday there was boiled mutton for dinner. "I won't have any," said Theresa; "I can't bear the colour of the fat. It looks like wool."
"Don't you like it, dearie? I'm so sorry."
"We all hate it."