Simultaneously Mrs. Weston planked down a plate of greens and vegetables in front of her husband. He attacked them nervously.
“It’s not good enough,” he said, after a pause, with the air of being vaguely reproachful against nobody in particular, “I tell you it’s not good enough.... I don’t know why these things should happen. It’s not as if she was a little girl....”
That was all he said.
The sound thrashing began soon afterwards. It was an extremely unscientific battery of slaps, in which Catherine dodged as best she could amongst the crowded furniture of the kitchen. Once she lurched against the table and knocked over the vinegar-bottle.
“I wish you wouldn’t ...” began Mr. Weston, and then stopped and continued eating.
After some moments of this gymnastic display both parties were hot and flushed with exertion, and the finale began when Mrs. Weston opened the door of the lobby and manœuvred Catherine out of the kitchen.
“Off you go,” she said. “Straight to bed ... str-h-aight to b-bed....”
The chase proceeded upstairs. Mrs. Weston’s stertorous breathing and heavy footfalls were the most conspicuous sounds.... A few seconds afterwards a loud banging of an upstairs door announced that hostilities were over.
In her tiny back bedroom Catherine sat down on a chair for breath. She was not physically hurt; in her “larking about” with boys and girls of her own age she had often paused for breath like this, and at such times there had been joy in her heart even when there had been pain in her body. But now she was conscious only of profound indignity. Her father’s vague protest echoed in her memory: “It’s not as if she were a little girl....”
She undressed and got into bed. It was quite dark, and she felt acutely miserable. Far away the pumping engine at the water-works whispered, as it always did at night-time, “Chug-chug ... chug-chug ... chug-chug-chug....” Ten, twelve years had passed since she had counted the five knobs on the brass rail of the bed. She was growing up, out of a child into a girl. She was not growing up without faults: she knew that. The worst trait in her was temper ... she would have to conquer that. She must learn self-control....