Anyone opening the door of Needham Farm kitchen that night at eight would have found the inmates at supper--a meagre supper, which should, according to the rule of the house, have been eaten in complete silence.

Hannah Grieve, the children's aunt, and mistress of the farm, thought it an offence to talk at meals.

She had not been so brought up.
But Louie this evening was in a state of nerves.

The afternoon had seen one of those periodical struggles between her and Hannah, which did so much to keep life at Needham Farm from stagnating into anything like comfort.

The two combatants, however, must have taken a certain joy in them, since they recurred with so much regularity.
Hannah had won, of course, as the grim self-importance of her bearing amply showed.