. . it may seem an odd thing to come from me . . . but I really haven't very much faith in them. I mean -- well, you know, they're all right if you break your leg or have something definite the matter with you, like mumps or scarlet fever -- or if you want a tumour cut out. But otherwise, well, they never seem to allow enough . . . I mean, for common-sense things. Now what I think is, as the child has held out so long, there must be a kind of toughness in him. And there's always just a chance you may still find the right thing."

But when, leaning over the cot, she saw the tiny, wizened creature that lay among its lace and ribbons: ("Hardly bigger than a rabbit, Richard . . . with the face of an old, old man -- no, more like a poor starved little monkey!") when, too, the feather-weight burden was laid on her lap, proving hardly more substantial than a child's doll: then, Mary's own heart fell.

Sitting looking down at the little wrinkled face, her mother eyes full of pity, she asked: "What does Purdy say?"

"'Im.?" Again Tilly raised her shoulders, but this time the gesture bespoke neither resignation nor despair. "Oh, Purd's sorry, of course."

"I should think so, indeed."

"Sorry! Does being sorry help?" And now her words came flying, her aitches scattering to the winds. "The plain truth is, Mary, there's not a man living who can go on 'earing a child cry, cry, cry, day and night and night and day, and keep 'is patience and 'is temper. And Purd's no different to the rest. When it gets too bad, 'e just claps on 'is 'at and flies out of the 'ouse -- to get away from it. Men are like that. Only the rosy side of things for them! And, Purd, 'e must be free. The smallest jerk of the reins and it's all up. As for a sick child . . . and even though it's 'is own -- oh, I've learnt something about men since I married 'im, Mary! Purd's no good to lean on, not an 'apporth o good. 'E's like an air-cushion -- goes in where you lean and puffs out somewhere else. And 'ow can 'e 'elp it? -- when there isn't anything but air in 'im.