Betty Trevor | Page 6

of course, and snapped vigorously. It was not her fault, she reflected. No one could be expected to be patient if other people would insist on being so horrid and exasperating!
CHAPTER THREE.
THE TREVOR FAMILY.
The family dinner was served at seven o'clock, and all the children, down to Pam herself, appeared at table, for Dr Trevor liked to have his family round him at the close of the day, and, thanks to his wife's good management, the meal was always a bright and cheery occasion.
Mrs Trevor was a devoted mother to every one of her flock, but the person in the house whom she mothered most of all was her hard-working husband, whose life was so devoted to others that he had little time to consider himself. From the children's earliest years they had been taught that to "worry father" was one of the most serious offences which they could commit.
"Father spends his life going about from one sickroom to another; all day long he is meeting people who are ill, and anxious, in fear, and in pain, and when he comes home he must have a cheery welcome. If you want to grumble about anything, grumble to yourselves or to me; if you have anything disagreeable to tell, let it wait until we are alone. Meal- times with father must be devoted to pleasant subjects alone." Such were Mrs Trevor's instructions, instilled into her children's minds with such persistent firmness that they were never disobeyed, with the result that the tired doctor came home with the happy certainty of enjoying a cheery, harmonious hour, and the young people themselves learnt a lesson in self-restraint which was of infinite value in after life.
Betty might grumble and tirade outside the schoolroom door, but as she approached the dining-room she mechanically smoothed her brow and adopted a cheerful expression. To-night Dr Trevor was already seated in his place at the end of the long table, for his wife took the head, to save him the fatigue of carving for so large a party. He was a tall, thin man, with a lined face lit by the keen, thoughtful eyes of the true physician. He looked up as his eldest daughter entered the room, and held out his hand to her in a mute caress. She bent to kiss his forehead, and stood holding his hand to chat for a few minutes until the other members of the family made their appearance. He noticed the Puritan-like coiffure--there were few things that those shrewd eyes did not notice--but made no comment thereon, for, as he frequently observed to his wife when she confided to him her troubles over Betty's eccentricities, boys and girls who are in the transition stage between childhood and maturity are apt to become a trifle restless and eccentric, and it was wisdom to be for the most part judiciously blind, interfering only in cases of right and wrong. Let the little maid run with a loose rein for a time. She would soon settle down, and be the first to laugh at her own foibles.
Mrs Trevor took her place, looking round on her assembled children with the pretty, half-appealing little smile which was her greatest charm. She was slight and graceful, not stout and elderly, like other people's mothers. In the morning light she often looked wan and tired, but in the kindly lamplight she seemed more like Betty's sister than the mother of a rapidly growing up family.
Miles sat at her right hand, a tall, somewhat heavy-looking youth, with enormous hands and feet, a square, determined jaw, and deep-set brown eyes. Even a casual glance at him was sufficient to show that he was going to make a man of power and determination, but, like Betty, he was passing through his awkward stage, and was often neither easy nor agreeable to live with.
Jack was just a mischievous schoolboy, with protruding ears and twinkling eyes. One can see a score like him any day, marching, marching along the street with satchels of books; but his twin sister had a more striking personality. Jill was a mystery to her relations and friends. She had ordinary brown hair, and not too much of that, light blue eyes with indifferent lashes, a nose a shade more impertinent than Betty's own, a big mouth, and a powdering of freckles under her eyes; yet with those very ordinary equipments she managed to rank as a beauty among her schoolmates, and to attract more admiration than is vouchsafed to many people whose features might have been turned out of a classic mould. Betty used to ponder wistfully over the secret of Jill's charm, and think it hard lines that it had not been given to herself, who would have cared for it so much more. Jill didn't