in Priorsford and keep the
villa-people in their places, and force the County to notice you. If I
had been like Mrs. Jowett you would just have had to be content with the
people on the Hill. Do you suppose I haven't known they didn't want to
come here and visit us? Oh, I knew, but I _made_ them. And it was all
for you. What did I care for them and their daft-like ways and their
uninteresting talk about dogs and books and things! It would have been
far nicer for me to have made friends with the people in the little
villas. My! I've often thought how I would relish a tea-party at the
Watsons'! Your father used to have a saying about it being better to be
at the head of the commonalty than at the tail of the gentry, and I know
it's true. Mrs. Duff-Whalley of The Towers would be a big body at the
Miss Watsons' tea-parties, and I know fine I'm only tolerated at the
Tweedies' and the Olivers' and all the others."

"Poor Mother! You've been splendid!"

"If you aren't happy, what does anything matter? I'm fair disheartened,
I tell you. I believe you're right. Money isn't much of a blessing. I've
never said it to you because you seemed so much a part of all the new
life, with your accent and your manners and your little dogs, but over
and over when people snubbed me, and I had to talk loud and brazen
because I felt so ill at ease, I've thought of the old days when I
helped your father in the shop. Those were my happiest days--before the
money came. I had a girl to look after the house and you children, and I
went between the house and the shop, and I never had a dull minute. Then
we came into some money, and that helped your father to extend and
extend. First we had a house in Murrayfield--and, my word, we thought we
were fine. But I aimed at Drumsheugh Gardens, and we got there. Your
father always gave in to me. Eh, he was a hearty man, your father. If
it's true what you say that none of you have charm, though I'm sure I
don't know what you mean by it, it's my blame, for your father was
popular with everyone. He used to laugh at me and my ambition, for, mind
you, I was always ambitious, but his was kindly laughter. Often and
often when I've been sitting all dressed up at some dinner-party, like
to yawn my head off with the dull talk, I've thought of the happy days
when I helped in the shop and did my own washing--eh, I little thought I
would ever live in a house where we never even know when it's washing
day--and went to bed t