erson she wished to resemble, much though she
admired her. Her common sense would assert itself almost brutally, and
Mrs. Hilbery, looking at her with her odd sidelong glance, that was half
malicious and half tender, would liken her to "your wicked old Uncle
Judge Peter, who used to be heard delivering sentence of death in the
bathroom. Thank Heaven, Katharine, I've not a drop of HIM in me!"

CHAPTER IV

At about nine o'clock at night, on every alternate Wednesday, Miss Mary
Datchet made the same resolve, that she would never again lend her
rooms for any purposes whatsoever. Being, as they were, rather large and
conveniently situated in a street mostly dedicated to offices off the
Strand, people who wished to meet, either for purposes of enjoyment,
or to discuss art, or to reform the State, had a way of suggesting that
Mary had better be asked to lend them her rooms. She always met the
request with the same frown of well-simulated annoyance, which presently
dissolved in a kind of half-humorous, half-surly shrug, as of a large
dog tormented by children who shakes his ears. She would lend her room,
but only on condition that all the arrangements were made by her. This
fortnightly meeting of a society for the free discussion of everything
entailed a great deal of moving, and pulling, and ranging of furniture
against the wall, and placing of breakable and precious things in safe
places. Miss Datchet was quite capable of lifting a kitchen table on
her back, if need were, for although well-proportioned and
dressed becomingly, she had the appearance of unusual strength and
determination.

She was some twenty-five years of age, but looked older because she
earned, or intended to earn, her own living, and had already lost the
look of the irresponsible spectator, and taken on that of the private in
the army of workers. Her gestures seemed to have a certain purpose, the
muscles round eyes and lips were set rather firmly, as though the senses
had undergone some discipline, and were held ready for a call on them.
She had contracted two faint lines between her eyebrows, not from
anxiety but from thought, and it was quite evident that all the feminine
instincts of pleasing, soothing, and charming were crossed by others in
no way peculiar to her sex. For the rest she was brown-eyed, a little
clumsy in movement, and suggested country birth and a descent from
respectable hard-working ancestors, who had been men of faith and
integr