Mr. Carlyle, who had grown up in a well-ordered home where everything was as neat and well-cared-for as things could be, did realise that there was much that was lacking in his own home; but whatever he may have suffered from the disorder, he never complained. His mother had had means, three good servants, and only one child to make the home untidy; whereas his young wife, who had been brought up in an Orphan School, had never known real home life until her marriage, had only small means, several young babies, and only one ignorant servant to help her.
Audrey and Faith, as they grew out of babyhood, helped to dust the rooms, run errands, and look after the younger children, but they had only the vaguest notions as to how homes should be kept, or meals served, or the hundred and one other little things which make all the difference between a well-kept house and an ill-kept one, and they were quite content with things as they were.
At least Faith was. Audrey often had misgivings that all was not as it should be, and yearned for something more orderly, dainty, and neat; for prettier clothes and prettier manners. And then Granny Carlyle had come on a visit, and had offered to take one of her many grandchildren to live with her—for a time, at any rate. And, to the joy of Audrey, and the relief of the others, she was chosen and they were not; and, with all her few possessions packed in her mother's old portmanteau, she had gone off to enjoy all the things that she considered best worth having—a large comfortable home in a town, new clothes, school, tempting food, daintily cooked meals, and peace and quiet in which she could read and write undisturbed. For though Audrey resembled her father's mother in many ways, she had also inherited her mother's taste for writing and reading. That was four years ago, when Audrey was eleven and Faith ten, and Deborah and Tom five and four respectively. Baby Joan, aged eighteen months, Audrey had not yet seen.
Thoughts of his eldest daughter were uppermost in Mr. Carlyle's mind as he glanced from the unappetising remains of a joint lying on a dish on which it had already appeared twice, to the scrap of dry cheese and the unpolished knife lying beside it.
"I—I am afraid that is all there is, father. Won't it do?" Faith looked at him with troubled eyes. "Shall I tell Mary to cook you some eggs?"
"No, no. What is here will do very well for me, but you—wouldn't you prefer eggs—or——"
"Oh no, thank you, I am so hungry I can eat anything," said Faith cheerfully. "Father, Joan is asleep, can't we tuck her up snugly on the sofa while we are having our supper? She would be certain to wake up if I took her upstairs to her cot."
"Of course she would. If you will make her a nice little nest on the sofa I will pop her into it so gently she will not know she has been moved. There now, wasn't that clever!"
Faith again held up a warning finger, but Joan only stretched her limbs a little in her new nest, and forthwith dropped asleep again.
With a smile of triumph at each other the two nurses turned away to the supper-table, and Mr. Carlyle said grace, and with her deep relief at the news about her mother still glowing in her heart, Faith joined in with a deeper sense of real gratitude than she had known before.