not to be repressed."

Julius knew that she was recollecting how Archie Douglas had
entreated to go to sea, and the desire had been quashed because he
was an only son. His inclination to speak was as perilous as if he
had been Rosamond herself, and he did not feel it unfortunate that
Jenny found she must no longer stay away from home.

CHAPTER XXII
Times Out of Joint

Alte der Meere,
Komm und hore;
Meine Frau, die Ilsebill,
Will nicht als ich will!

Life at Compton Poynsett was different from what it had been when
the two youngest sons had been at home, and Julius and Rosamond in
the house. The family circle had grown much more stiff and quiet,
and the chief difference caused by Mrs. Poynsett's presence was that
Raymond was deprived of his refuge in her room. Cecil had taken a
line of polite contempt. There was always a certain languid amount
of indifferent conversation, 'from the teeth outward,' as Rosamond
said. Every home engagement was submitted to the elder lady with
elaborate scrupulousness, almost like irony. Visitors in the house
or invitations out of it, were welcome breaks, and the whirl of
society which vaguely alarmed Joanna Bowater was a relief to the
inhabitants of the Hall.

Anne's companionship was not lively for her mother-in-law, but she
was brightening in the near prospect of Miles's return, and they had
established habits that carried them well through the evening. Anne
covered screens and made scrap-books, and did other work for the
bazaar; and Mrs. Poynsett cut out pictures, made suggestions, and
had associations of her own with the combinations of which Anne had
little notion. Or she dictated letters which Anne wrote, and
through all these was a kindly, peaceful spirit, most unlike the
dreary alienation in which Cecil persevered.

To Cecil this seemed the anxious desire for her lawful rights. She
had been used to spend the greater part of the evening at the piano,
but her awakened eyes perceived that this was a cover to Raymond's
conversations at his mother's sofa; so she sat tying knots in stiff
thread at her macrame lace pillow, making the bazaar a plea for
nothing but work. Raymond used to arm himself with the newspapers
as the safest point d'appui, and the talk was happiest when it
_only_ languished, for it could do much worse.

"Shall you be at Sirenwood to-morrow, Cecil?" asked Mrs. Poynsett,
as she was wheeled to her station by the fire after dinner. "Will