"A small bed? But there's a bed there already, dear."
"That big thing's only fit for a sick woman. I won't wallow in it any longer."
"But dearest, all your forefathers wallowed, as you call it, in it. Doesn't it seem rather—a pity not to carry on traditions?"
"Well mother be kind and dear, and let me depart in peace from them. A camp bed,—that's what I'd like. Shall I order it, or will you? And did I tell you I've given Bryce the sack?"
"Bryce? Why, what has he done?"
"Oh he hasn't done anything that I know of, except make a sort of doll or baby of me. Why should I be put into my clothes and taken out of them again as though I hadn't been weaned yet?"
Now all this was very bad, but the greatest blow for Lady Shuttleworth fell when Tussie declared that he would not come of age. The cheerful face with which his mother had managed to listen to his other defiances went very blank at that; do what she would she could not prevent its falling. "Not come of age?" she repeated stupidly. "But my darling, you can't help yourself—you must come of age."
"Oh I know I can't help being twenty-one and coming into all this"—and he waved contemptuous arms—"but I won't do it blatantly."
"I—I don't understand," faltered Lady Shuttleworth.
"There mustn't be any fuss, mother."