"Thank you, Margaret: they wanted it badly. I am glad you can
make yourself useful, after all," he said.
"Yes, Father."
Meg stitched on industriously.
He went batik to his study, where Pip's head was at a studious,
absorbed angle, and pyramids of books and sheaves of paper were
on the table. He wrote two more letters, and there came a little
knock at the door.
"Come in," he called; and there entered Nell.
She was carrying very carefully a little tray covered with a
snow-white doyley, and on it were a glass of milk and a plate
of mulberries. She placed it before him.
"I thought perhaps you would like a little lunch, Father," she
said gently; and Pip was seized with a sudden coughing fit.
"My DEAR child!" he said.
He looked at it very thoughtfully.
"The last glass of milk I had, Nellie, was when I was Pip's age,
and was Barlow's fag at Rugby. It made me ill, and I have never
touched it since."
"But this won't hurt you. You will drink this?" She gave him one
of her most beautiful looks.
"I would as soon drink the water the maids wash up in, my child."
He took a mulberry, ate it, and made a wry face. "They're not,
fit to eat."
"After you've eaten about six you don't notice they're sour,"
she said eagerly.
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