clogging--this is life at its simplest," and she rang for coffee, which
came in a breakfast-cup and was made of Somebody's essence and boiling
water.

Pamela had gone to bed very early, there being absolutely nothing to sit
up for; and the bed was as hard as the nether millstone. As she put her
tired head on a cast-iron pillow covered by a cotton pillow-slip, and
lay crushed under three pairs of hard blankets, topped by a patchwork
quilt worked by Bella's mother and containing samples of the clothes of
all the family--from the late Mrs. Bathgate's wedding-gown of
puce-coloured cashmere to her youngest son's first pair of "breeks," the
whole smelling strongly of naphtha from the _kist_ where it had
lain--regretful thoughts of other beds came to her. She felt she had not
fully appreciated them--those warm, soft, embracing beds, with
satin-smooth sheets and pillow-cases smelling of lavender and other
sweet things, feather-light blankets, and rose-coloured eiderdowns.

She came downstairs in the morning to the bleak sitting-room filled with
a distaste for simplicity which she felt to be unworthy. For breakfast
there was a whole loaf on a platter, three breakfast rolls hot from the
baker, and the family toast-rack full of tough, damp toast. A large
pale-green duck's egg sat heavily in an egg-cup, capped, but not
covered, by a strange red flannel thing representing a cock's head,
which Pamela learned later was called an "egg-cosy" and had come from
the sale of work for Foreign Missions. A metal teapot and water-jug
stood in two green worsted nests.

Pamela poured herself out some tea. "I'm almost sure I told her I wanted
coffee in the morning," she murmured to herself, "but it doesn't
matter." Already she was beginning to hold Bella Bathgate in awe. She