eyes, whose color he could not determine, under eyebrows
that waved in the middle and twitched faintly, or a dress that was blue,
with the queerest effect of another color at the back of it, or perhaps
the feeling of a torrent flowing there under a coat of ice, that might
give way in little holes, so that your leg went in but not the whole of
you. Something, anyway, made him feel both small and heavy--that awkward
combination for a man accustomed to associate himself with cheerful but
solid dignity. In seating himself by request at a table, in what seemed
to be a sort of kitchen, he experienced a singular sensation in the legs,
and heard her say, as it might be to the air:

"Biddy, dear, take Susie and Billy out."

And thereupon a little girl with a sad and motherly face came crawling
out from underneath the table, and dropped him a little courtesy. Then
another still smaller girl came out, and a very small boy, staring with
all his eyes.

All these things were against Stanley, and he felt that if he did not
make it quite clear that he was there he would soon not know where he
was.

"I came," he said, "to talk about this business up at Malloring's." And,
encouraged by having begun, he added: "Whose kids were those?"

A level voice with a faint lisp answered him:

"They belong to a man called Tryst; he was turned out of his cottage on
Wednesday because his dead wife's sister was staying with him, so we've
taken them in. Did you notice the look on the face of the eldest?"

Stanley nodded. In truth, he had noticed something, though what he could
not have said.

"At nine years old she has to do the housework and be a mother to the
other two, besides going to school. This is all because Lady Malloring
has conscientious scruples about marriage with a deceased wife's sister."

'Certainly'--thought Stanley--'that does sound a bit thick!' And he
asked:

"Is the woman here, too?"

"No, she's gone home for the present."

He felt relief.

"I suppose Malloring's point is," he said, "whether or not you're to do
what you like with your own property. For instance, if you had let this
cottage to some one you thought was harming the neighborhood, wouldn't
you terminate his tenancy?"

She answered, still in that level voice:

"Her action is cowardly, narrow, and tyrannical, and no amount of
sophistry will make me think differently."

Stanley felt precisely as if one of his feet had gone through the ice
into wa