"Remember it is for this summer," shouted the Other.
"And not to adorn our graves, my dear," came after us.
What had happened in my short absence? I saw with new eyes, the eyes not of the fond mother but of the critic.
"Jim!" and my whisper was awful.
"What's up? Have we done anything wrong?"
"Look at them!"
They looked absurd. They looked impossible. The bed so big and they so small, so like tiny tin soldiers, that my faith failed me. The Others would be confronted by little green twigs all the summer and regret Griggs's régime. It was hopeless! they could never rise to the occasion.
"They must come up, Jim."
"Oh, rot! Let's put 'em a bit thicker; they will flower all right, you said so half-an-hour ago."
"I don't know what I said half-an-hour ago; I feel sure now that they will take months to do anything! And what shall I do meanwhile? It's the pricking out; we were behind with that, you see. They must come up and go somewhere, where it won't matter so awfully. These beds must be a success, even if I spend every farthing I possess on buying ready-made plants."