"Oh, thank you so much," said Annie. She coloured faintly. "Perhaps
you would not be straight," she said after a minute, "if you had no
prospect whatever in life but Uncle Maurice--Uncle Maurice, and all the
old women in the parish, every one of them, setting their caps at him,
and knitting comforters for his dear throat, and working slippers for
his dear feet, and asking about his precious cough, and if he would like
some more red-currant jelly. Perhaps _you_ would be a little crooked if
you had to sit by the hour holding slobbering babies on your lap at
mothers' meetings, and getting your best frock jammed over by the horrid
village children. Oh, it is not a life to recommend itself, I can tell
you!"