livid, her foolish eyes starting from their sockets. Fanny, a sort of
Mother Cary's chicken, revelled in the row, and screamed her merriment.

It was long before the domestic uproar wholly subsided, but
towards eleven o'clock the sisters found themselves together in the
drawing-room. Ada sprawled limply on a sofa; Beatrice sat with legs
crossed in the most comfortable chair; and Fanny twirled about on a
music stool.

The only books in the room were a few show-volumes, which belonged to
Arthur Peachey, and half-a-dozen novels of the meaner kind, wherewith
Ada sometimes beguiled her infinite leisure. But on tables and chairs
lay scattered a multitude of papers: illustrated weeklies, journals of
society, cheap miscellanies, penny novelettes, and the like. At the end
of the week, when new numbers came in, Ada Peachey passed many hours
upon her sofa, reading instalments of a dozen serial stories, paragraphs
relating to fashion, sport, the theatre, answers to correspondents
(wherein she especially delighted), columns of facetiae, and gossip
about notorious people. Through a great deal of this matter Beatrice
followed her, and read much besides in which Ada took no interest;
she studied a daily newspaper, with special note of law suits, police
intelligence, wills, bankruptcies, and any concern, great or small,
wherein money played a part. She understood the nature of investments,
and liked to talk about stocks and shares with her male acquaintances.

They were the daughters of a Camberwell builder, lately deceased; to
each of them had fallen a patrimony just sufficient for their support
in elegant leisure. Ada's money, united with a small capital in her
husband's possession, went to purchase a share in the business of
Messrs. Ducker, Blunt & Co., manufacturers of disinfectants; Arthur
Peachey, previously a clerk to the firm, became a junior partner, with
the result that most of the hard work was thrown upon his shoulders. At
their marriage, the happy pair first of all established themselves in a
modest house near Camberwell Road; two years later, growing prosperity
brought about their removal to De Crespigny Park, where they had now
resided for some twelve months. Unlike their elder sister, Beatrice and
Fanny had learnt to support themselves, Beatrice in the postal service,
and Fanny, sweet blossom! by mingling her fragrance with that of a
florist's shop in Brixton; but on their father's death both forsook
their employment,