Aloud she said: "I feel idle, myself.

We'll sit about for an hour, and you'll stay to dinner with Arthur and me--we have it here to-day, as your mother is going out.
Afterwards I must do my round." A silence, with Adelaide wondering where Ross was and just when he would return.

Then Madelene went on: "I've been trying to persuade your mother to give up the house, change it into a hospital." The impudence of it! _Their_ house, _their_ home; and this newcomer into the family--a newcomer from nowhere--trying to get it away from them! "Mother said something about it," said Adelaide frostily.

"But she didn't say _you_ had been at her.

I think she ought to be left alone in her old age." "The main thing is to keep her interested in life, don't you think ?" suggested Madelene, noting how Adelaide was holding herself in check, but disregarding it.