"No, Mamma. I couldn't. They're my secret."
"That was all very well when you were a little thing. But a great girl of twelve—You ought to be ashamed of yourself."
Mamma had gone. She had taken away the baby-clothes. Mary lay face downwards on her bed.
Shame burned through her body like fire. Hot tears scalded her eyelids. She thought: "How was I to know you mustn't have babies?" Still, she couldn't give them all up. She must keep Isabel and the red-haired baby.
But what would Mr. Ponsonby think of her if he knew?
IV.
"Mr. Ponsonby. Mr. Ponsonby! Stay where you are and look!"
From the window at the end of the top corridor the side of the house went sheer down into the lane. Mary was at the window. Mr. Ponsonby was in the lane.
She climbed on to the ledge and knelt there. Grasping the bottom of the window frame firmly with both hands and letting her knees slide from the ledge, she lowered herself, and hung for one ecstatic moment, and drew herself up again by her arms.
"What did you do it for, Mary?"