"But where has it all gone?"

"You'll find all the papers, I think, if you look--beside ten pound as
he owed me, an' six pound as the wedding cost down here."

"Six pounds!" echoed Gertrude Morel. It seemed to her monstrous that,
after her own father had paid so heavily for her wedding, six pounds
more should have been squandered in eating and drinking at Walter's
parents' house, at his expense.

"And how much has he sunk in his houses?" she asked.

"His houses--which houses?"

Gertrude Morel went white to the lips. He had told her the house he
lived in, and the next one, was his own.

"I thought the house we live in--" she began.

"They're my houses, those two," said the mother-in-law. "And not clear
either. It's as much as I can do to keep the mortgage interest paid."

Gertrude sat white and silent. She was her father now.

"Then we ought to be paying you rent," she said coldly.

"Walter is paying me rent," replied the mother.

"And what rent?" asked Gertrude.