After sitting thus for some minutes a small girl popped her head in to say, "Mother says, aren't you coming down, Ralph?
Uncle Joseph--" "They're to bring my dinner up here," said Ralph, peremptorily; whereupon she vanished, leaving the door ajar in her haste to be gone.
After Denham had waited some minutes, in the course of which neither he nor the rook took their eyes off the fire, he muttered a curse, ran downstairs, intercepted the parlor-maid, and cut himself a slice of bread and cold meat.

As he did so, the dining-room door sprang open, a voice exclaimed "Ralph!" but Ralph paid no attention to the voice, and made off upstairs with his plate.

He set it down in a chair opposite him, and ate with a ferocity that was due partly to anger and partly to hunger.

His mother, then, was determined not to respect his wishes; he was a person of no importance in his own family; he was sent for and treated as a child.

He reflected, with a growing sense of injury, that almost every one of his actions since opening the door of his room had been won from the grasp of the family system.