THE WINDOW

done. If they could be taught to wipe their feet
and not bring the beach in with them—that
would be something. Crabs, she had to allow, if
Andrew really wished to dissect them, or if Jasper
believed that one could make soup from seaweed,
one could not prevent it; or Rose's objects—
shells, reeds, stones; for they were gifted, her
children, but all in quite different ways. And
the result of it was, she sighed, taking in the
whole room from floor to ceiling, as she held
the stocking against James's leg, that things
got shabbier and got shabbier summer after
summer. The mat was fading; the wall-paper was
flapping. You couldn't tell any more that those
were roses on it. Still, if every door in a house is
left perpetually open, and no lockmaker in the
whole of Scotland can mend a bolt, things must
spoil. What was the use of flinging a green
Cashmere shawl over the edge of a picture frame?
In two weeks it would be the colour of pea soup.
But it was the doors that annoyed her; every door
was left open. She listened. The drawing-room
door was open; the hall door was open; it
sounded as if the bedroom doors were open; and
certainly the window on the landing was open,
for that she had opened herself. That windows
should be open, and doors shut—simple as it was,
could none of them remember it? She would go

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