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 1. 4.6.1 Using a Dictionary to Compute a Frequency
Table
2. 4.6.2 Computing a Frequency Table Without a
Dictionary
3. 4.6.3 Visualizing a Frequency Distribution

7. 4.7 Dispersion: Standard Deviation

8. 4.8 Summary

1. Key Terms
2. Python Keywords, Functions, and Methods
3. Programming Exercises

11. 5 Bigger Data: File I/O

1. 5.1 Objectives
2. 5.2 Using Files for Large Data Sets

1. 5.2.1 Text Files

2. 5.2.2 Iterating over Lines in a File
3. 5.2.3 Writing a File
4. 5.2.4 String Formatting
5. 5.2.5 Alternative File-Reading Methods

3. 5.3 Reading Data from the Internet

1. 5.3.1 Using CSV Files

2. 5.3.2 Using a while Loop to Process Data
3. 5.3.3 List Comprehension
4. 5.3.4 Reading JSON Data from the Internet

4. 5.4 Correlating Data

5. 5.5 Summary

1. Key Terms
2. Python Keywords and Functions
3. Programming Exercise

12. 6 Image Processing

 1. 6.1 Objectives
2. 6.2 What Is Digital Image Processing?

1. 6.2.1 The RGB Color Model

2. 6.2.2 The cImage Module

3. 6.3 Basic Image Processing

1. 6.3.1 Negative Images

2. 6.3.2 Grayscale
3. 6.3.3 A General Solution: The Pixel Mapper

4. 6.4 Parameters, Parameter Passing, and Scope

1. 6.4.1 Call by Assignment Parameter Passing

2. 6.4.2 Namespaces
3. 6.4.3 Calling Functions and Finding Names
4. 6.4.4 Modules and Namespaces

5. 6.5 Advanced Image Processing

1. 6.5.1 Resizing
2. 6.5.2 Stretching: A Different Perspective
3. 6.5.3 Flipping an Image
4. 6.5.4 Edge Detection

6. 6.6 Summary

1. Key Terms
2. Python Keywords, Functions, and Variables
3. Programming Exercises

13. 7 Data Mining: Cluster Analysis

1. 7.1 Objectives
2. 7.2 What Is Data Mining?
3. 7.3 Cluster Analysis: A Simple Example
4. 7.4 Implementing Cluster Analysis on Simple Data
 1. 7.4.1 Distance Between Two Points
2. 7.4.2 Clusters and Centroids
3. 7.4.3 The K-Means Cluster Analysis Algorithm
4. 7.4.4 Implementation of K-Means
5. 7.4.5 Implementation of K-Means, Continued

5. 7.5 Implementing Cluster Analysis: Earthquakes

1. 7.5.1 File Processing

2. 7.5.2 Visualization

6. 7.6 Cluster Analysis Shortcomings and Solutions

7. 7.7 Summary

1. Key Terms
2. Python Keywords
3. Programming Exercises

14. 8 Cryptanalysis

1. 8.1 Objectives
2. 8.2 Introduction
3. 8.3 Cracking the Rail Fence

1. 8.3.1 Checking Our Work with a Dictionary

2. 8.3.2 A Brute-Force Solution
3. 8.3.3 A Rail Fence Decryption Algorithm

4. 8.4 Cracking the Substitution Cipher

1. 8.4.1 Letter Frequency

2. 8.4.2 Ciphertext Frequency Analysis
3. 8.4.3 Letter Pair Analysis
4. 8.4.4 Word Frequency Analysis
5. 8.4.5 Pattern Matching with Partial Words
6. 8.4.6 Regular Expression Summary

5. 8.5 Summary
 1. Key Terms
2. Python Functions, Methods, and Keywords
3. Programming Exercises

15. 9 Fractals: The Geometry of Nature

1. 9.1 Objectives
2. 9.2 Introduction
3. 9.3 Recursive Programs

1. 9.3.1 Recursive Squares

2. 9.3.2 Classic Recursive Functions
3. 9.3.3 Drawing a Recursive Tree
4. 9.3.4 The Sierpinski Triangle
5. 9.3.5 Call Tree for a Sierpinski Triangle

4. 9.4 Snowflakes, Lindenmayer, and Grammars

1. 9.4.1 L-Systems
2. 9.4.2 Automatically Expanding Production Rules
3. 9.4.3 More Advanced L-Systems

5. 9.5 Summary

1. Key Terms
2. Programming Exercises

16. 10 Planet Objects

1. 10.1 Objectives
2. 10.2 Introduction

1. 10.2.1 Programming
2. 10.2.2 Object-Oriented Programming
3. 10.2.3 Python Classes

3. 10.3 Designing and Implementing a Planet Class

1. 10.3.1 Constructor Method

 2. 10.3.2 Accessor Methods
3. 10.3.3 Mutator Methods
4. 10.3.4 Special Methods
5. 10.3.5 Methods and self
6. 10.3.6 Details of Method Storage and Lookup

4. 10.4 Designing and Implementing a Sun Class

5. 10.5 Designing and Implementing a Solar System
6. 10.6 Animating the Solar System

1. 10.6.1 Using Turtles

2. 10.6.2 Planetary Orbits
3. 10.6.3 Implementation

7. 10.7 Summary

1. Key Terms
2. Python Keywords and Functions
3. Programming Exercises

17. 11 Simulation

1. 11.1 Objectives
2. 11.2 Bears and Fish
3. 11.3 What Is a Simulation?
4. 11.4 Rules of the Game
5. 11.5 Design
6. 11.6 Implementation

1. 11.6.1 The World Class

2. 11.6.2 The Fish Class
3. 11.6.3 The Bear Class
4. 11.6.4 Main Simulation

7. 11.7 Growing Plants

8. 11.8 A Note on Inheritance
9. 11.9 Summary

1. Key Terms
 2. Python Keywords and Functions
3. Programming Exercises

18. 12 Father Was a Rectangle

1. 12.1 Objectives
2. 12.2 Introduction
3. 12.3 First Design
4. 12.4 Basic Implementation

1. 12.4.1 The Canvas Class

2. 12.4.2 The GeometricObject Class
3. 12.4.3 The Point Class
4. 12.4.4 The Line Class
5. 12.4.5 Testing Our Implementation

5. 12.5 Understanding Inheritance

6. 12.6 Limitations
7. 12.7 An Improved Implementation
8. 12.8 Implementing Polygons
9. 12.9 Summary

1. Key Terms
2. Python Keywords, Methods, and Decorator
3. Programming Exercises

19. 13 Video Games

1. 13.1 Objectives
2. 13.2 Introduction

1. 13.2.1 Event-Driven Programming

2. 13.2.2 Simulating an Event Loop
3. 13.2.3 A Multithreaded Event Loop

3. 13.3 Event-Driven Programming with the Turtle

1. 13.3.1 A Simple Etch-a-Sketch Using Key Presses

2. 13.3.2 Placing Turtles Using Mouse Clicks
 3. 13.3.3 Bouncing Turtles

4. 13.4 Creating Your Own Video Game

1. 13.4.1 The LaserCannon Class

2. 13.4.2 The BoundedTurtle Class
3. 13.4.3 The Drone Class
4. 13.4.4 The Bomb Class
5. 13.4.5 Putting All the Pieces Together

5. 13.5 Summary

1. Key Terms
2. Python Keywords and Decorator
3. Programming Exercises

20. APPENDIX A Installing the Required Software

1. A.1 Installing Python

2. A.2 Installing the Python Image Library and cImage

21. APPENDIX B Python Quick Reference

1. B.1 Python Reserved Words

2. B.2 Numeric Data Types
3. B.3 Built-in Functions
4. B.4 Sequence Operators
5. B.5 Dictionaries
6. B.6 Files
7. B.7 Formatting Output
8. B.8 Iteration
9. B.9 Boolean Expressions
10. B.10 Selection
11. B.11 Python Modules
12. B.12 Regular Expression Patterns
13. B.13 Defining Functions
14. B.14 Defining Classes
15. B.15 Deleting Objects
16. B.16 Common Error Messages
 22. APPENDIX C turtle Reference

1. C.1 Basic Move and Draw

2. C.2 Turtle State
3. C.3 Drawing State
4. C.4 Filling
5. C.5 More Drawing Control
6. C.6 Controlling the Shape and Appearance
7. C.7 Measurement Settings
8. C.8 Drawing Speed
9. C.9 Color
10. C.10 Events
11. C.11 Miscellaneous

23. APPENDIX D Answers to Selected “Try It Out” Exercises

24. INDEX

Landmarks
1. Frontmatter
2. Start of Content
3. Index

1. i
2. ii
3. iii
4. iv
5. v
6. vi
7. vii
8. viii
9. ix
10. x
11. xi
12. xii
13. xiii
14. xiv
15. xv
16. xvi
17. xvii
18. xviii
19. 1
20. 2
21. 3
22. 4
23. 5
24. 6
25. 7
26. 8
27. 9
28. 10
29. 11
30. 12
31. 13
32. 14
33. 15
34. 16
35. 17
36. 18
37. 19
38. 20
39. 21
40. 22
41. 23
42. 24
43. 25
44. 26
45. 27
46. 28
47. 29
48. 30
49. 31
50. 32
51. 33
52. 34
53. 35
54. 36
55. 37
Visit https://testbankfan.com
now to explore a rich
collection of testbank or
solution manual and enjoy
exciting offers!
56. 38
57. 39
58. 40
59. 41
60. 42
61. 43
62. 44
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64. 46
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75. 57
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79. 61
80. 62
81. 63
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95. 77
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260. 242
Exploring the Variety of Random
Documents with Different Content
“We shall have to see about some lessons for her in the mornings,”
said Aunt Beryl rather repressively.
“Eh, what’s that? You don’t want to go to school, do you, my dear?”
Lydia wanted to go to school very much, and had always resented
her mother’s refusal to send her there, and the irregular, desultory
lessons at home, from which she knew that she learnt nothing
useful.
But already she felt certain that to say so would not advance her
cause with Grandpapa.
“I have never been to school,” she said at last.
“A very good thing too. I don’t like all this business of girls trying to
be like boys, and learning all sorts of rough ways.”
Old Raymond cast a malicious glance at his daughter Evelyn, whose
two girls attended a high school.
“You’re tired, Grandpapa,” she said gently and unresentfully,
although she coloured.
“What made you sit in the drawing-room to-day?” asked Aunt Beryl.
“You know you always stay in the dining-room until six o’clock.”
Grandpapa’s perfectly alert old face suddenly assumed a blank
expression.
“Eh, my dear?” he said vacantly.
Aunt Beryl repeated the observation in a higher key.
“I can’t hear you,” said Grandpapa obstinately.
Aunt Evelyn and Aunt Beryl exchanged glances.
“Don’t do that, my dears, it’s very ill-bred. Even little Lyddie here can
tell you that. Very bad manners to exchange glances. I suppose you
thought I couldn’t see you, but I’ve got very good eyes yet.”
The old man chuckled gaily at the discomfiture on the faces of the
two women.
“You must come downstairs now, Grandpapa. It’s tea-time,” said
Aunt Beryl firmly.
Lydia wondered how anyone so very old and frail could ever be
taken downstairs. Did Uncle George carry him? She saw with horror
that neither of her aunts made any move to assist him as he leant
forward and gripped a stout stick that stood against the arm-chair.
Then he began to slide down the seat of the deep chair, his old
frame quite rigid, one hand clutching the arm of the chair, the other
the stick.
“Oh!” cried Lydia involuntarily.
Grandpapa, his face tense and his breathing very loud, never looked
at her, but both the aunts said, “Hush!”
So she stood quite silent, very much interested and rather
frightened, while the tiny, taut old frame twisted itself to the
perpendicular, and at last stood erect. Then, and then only,
Grandpapa accepted the support of Aunt Beryl’s arm to supplement
that of the stick as he went very, very slowly downstairs, one step at
a time.
Aunt Evelyn, following behind with Lydia, explained to her that
Grandpapa never allowed anyone to help him out of his chair.
“You will learn all the little ways of the house in time,” said Aunt
Evelyn kindly. “You know we hope that this is to be your home.”
“Yes, auntie,” said Lydia submissively.
A dim, resentful consciousness was slowly creeping over her that “to
learn all the little ways of the house” is the endless and often
uncongenial concomitant to that orphaned state to which she had
proudly laid claim.
 II
It was not difficult to learn the routine of life at Regency Terrace. By
the end of the autumn Lydia felt as though she had always lived
there.
It was very monotonous.
Breakfast was at eight o’clock, and Lydia found herself expected to
partake of bread-and-milk, to which she was not accustomed, and
which rather annoyed her because she knew they only gave it to her
in order to satisfy Grandpapa’s old-fashioned sense of the
appropriate.
Immediately after breakfast she went out, so as to give Aunt Beryl
time to see to the housekeeping before her lessons.
“A good brisk walk up and down the Front,” her aunt said
encouragingly. “There are never many people there early.”
After September, indeed, there were hardly ever any people there at
all.
Lydia did not dislike her solitary promenades from one end of the
Esplanade to the other, except on the days when there was an east
wind, when she hated it.
At first she was allowed to take Grandpapa’s dog, Shamrock, with
her, although with many misgivings on the part of Aunt Beryl.
Shamrock was reputedly a Sealyham terrier, and Grandpapa was
inordinately attached to him. He roared with laughter when Uncle
George said angrily that the dog made a fool of him by flattening
himself under the front wheel of the bicycle which daily conveyed
Uncle George to his office; and when Shamrock made all Regency
Terrace hideous with howls, on the few occasions that Uncle George
kicked him out of the way, Grandpapa’s deafness immediately
assailed him in its most pronounced form, and he assured his
daughter that he could hear nothing at all, and that it was all her
fancy.
“Good little dog, Shamrock,” said Grandpapa approvingly, when
Shamrock prostrated himself in an attitude of maudlin affection
before the old man’s arm-chair, as he invariably did, to the disgust of
the household.
He also showed himself scrupulously obedient to Grandpapa’s
lightest word, although unfortunate Aunt Beryl might still be hoarse
from prolonged cries at the hall-door in a vain endeavour to defend
the bare legs of hapless little passing children, whom Shamrock took
a delight in terrifying, although he never hurt them.
Lydia liked Shamrock because he always pranced along so gaily,
and wagged his tail so effusively, and also because she suspected
him of more than sharing her dislike of the parrot.
But their walks together were not a success. There was only one
crossing, but Shamrock always contrived to negotiate it as badly as
possible under an advancing tram, thus causing the driver to shout
angrily at Lydia. He would simulate sudden, delighted recognitions of
invalid old ladies in bath-chairs, and hurl himself upon them with
extravagant demonstrations, until the bath-chair men, to most of
whom he was only too well known, would seize him by the scruff of
the neck and hurl him away.
Finally, as he never entered the house when Lydia did, but invariably
contrived to give her the slip and extended the excursion by himself,
Aunt Beryl no longer allowed her to take him out. Lydia was sorry,
but she made no lamentations. If one lived with people, it was
always better to conform to their wishes, she had long ago
discovered. Her innate philosophy waxed with the disproportionate
rapidity sometimes seen in children who are dependent on other
than their natural surroundings, for a home.
Crudely put, she conformed to each environment in which she found
herself, but—and in this, Lydia, without knowing it, was exceptional—
she never lost a particle of her own strong individuality. She merely
waited, quite unconsciously, for an opportunity when it might
expediently be set free.
With Aunt Beryl she was a docile, rather silent little girl. Aunt Beryl
gave her lessons every morning from “Little Arthur”, and set her
arithmetic problems of which Lydia knew very well that she did not
herself know the workings, and to which she merely looked up the
answers in a key, and also made her practise scales upon the piano
in the drawing-room.
“It will make your fingers nice and supple, even if one or two of the
keys won’t sound,” said Aunt Beryl. “I’ll write a note to the piano
tuner next week.”
But she never did.
Lydia thought gloomily that she was learning even less now than in
the old days in London, when her mother had, at least, taught her
scraps of French, and given her innumerable books to read. Aunt
Beryl declared that Lydia could go on with French by herself, and a
French grammar was bought.
“I’ll hear you say your verbs,” said Aunt Beryl, harassed, “but I’ve
forgotten my accent long ago.”
As for books, there were none in the Regency Terrace house. When
Aunt Beryl wanted to read, she had recourse to Weldon’s Fashion
Journal, or to an occasional Home Chat. Grandpapa had the daily
paper read to him, but her aunt once told Lydia that “Grandpapa
used to be a great reader, but he can’t see now without glasses, and
he won’t use them. So he never reads.”
Uncle George, indeed, often brought home a book from the Public
Library in the evenings, but he did not offer to lend them to Lydia,
neither did such titles attract her as “Goodman’s Applied Mechanics,”
or somebody else’s “Theory of Heat, Light, and Sound”. Aunt Beryl,
however, was kind, and when Lydia had once said that she liked
reading, she promised her a story-book for Christmas. It was then
October.
Meanwhile she taught her needlework, and Lydia learnt to make her
own blouses, and to knit woollen underwear for a necessitous class
vaguely designated by Aunt Beryl as “the pore”.
Sewing was the only thing that Aunt Beryl taught Lydia in such a way
as to make it interesting. She had no lessons after dinner, which was
in the middle of the day. Sometimes in the afternoon she walked
slowly on the Esplanade with Aunt Beryl beside Grandpapa’s chair,
but more often, as the weather grew colder, she and Aunt Beryl went
out alone, and then they walked briskly into what Aunt Beryl called
“the town”. The part where Regency Terrace stood was the
“residential quarter”.
“The town” mainly consisted of King Street and one of those tributary
streets where the shops were. Lydia rather liked the shopping
expeditions with Aunt Beryl, and felt important when the grocer’s boy
or the ironmonger’s young lady took an order, and said, “Yes, Miss
Raymond. Good afternoon, Miss Raymond,” without asking for any
address.
Sometimes when Aunt Beryl’s list was a long one, and the darkness
of approaching winter fell early, she took Lydia in to have tea at a
small establishment known to King Street as the “Dorothy Cayfe,”
and the shopping was resumed afterwards, in the cheerful light of
the prevalent gas. This happened seldom, however, as Aunt Beryl
liked to be at home, in order to give Grandpapa his tea—which was
not wonderful, since whenever she failed to do so her parent never
omitted to make caustic allusion to the “long outing that she must
have been enjoying in the good fresh air.”
When Aunt Beryl had duly been present at the rite of tea, however, it
was an understood thing that she went out for a couple of hours
afterwards, and left Lydia to entertain Grandpapa. “I am just going to
step round to the Jacksons, dear, with my work. I’ll be back by six
o’clock or so.” That was really the time that Lydia liked best.
She soon found out that with Grandpapa she might be her own
shrewd, little cynical self. He only required outward decorum and an
absence of any modern slang or noisiness, which accorded well with
Lydia’s natural taste and early training.
She also speedily discovered that Grandpapa thought her clever and
that so long as her opinions and judgments were her own, he was
ready to listen to them with amusement and interest. Any affectation
or insincerity he would pounce upon in a moment. “Don’t humbug,”
he sometimes said sharply. “It’s the worst policy in the world.
Humbug always ends in muddle.”
“Shamrock’s a humbug,” said the old man once, chuckling as he
fondled the little white dog. “He’s a humbug and he’ll come to a bad
end. When I’m dead, they’ll get rid of Shamrock. They think I’m taken
in by his humbug, but I know he’s a bad dog.”
Lydia could not help thinking that “they” had some excuse in
supposing Grandpapa to be blind and deaf to his protégé’s iniquities,
but she put out her hand and patted the dog’s rough head.
“Would you look after Shamrock, Lyddie?”
“Yes, Grandpapa, I am very fond of him.”
“Why?” said Grandpapa sharply.
“Because he amuses me,” answered Lydia truthfully.
“Ah ha! we all find it amusing to see other people being made fools
of!” was Grandpapa’s charitable sentiment. “Well, you shall have him
one of these days, Lyddie. I hope you’ll have a good home to give
him. What do you mean to do when you’re grown up?”
“Write books,” said Lydia.
To Aunt Beryl she would have said, “Get married and have two boys
and a little girl, auntie”—but her Aunt Beryl would never have dreamt
of asking her this question.
“Heigh?” said Grandpapa, in a rather astonished voice.
“Write books.”
“A blue stocking never gets a husband,” said Grandpapa
sententiously.
Lydia did not know what a blue stocking was, although she deduced
that it was no compliment to be called one, but she was too proud to
ask.
“What sort of books do you want to write?”
“Stories,” said Lydia, “and perhaps poetry.”
“Have you ever tried?”
“Yes, Grandpapa.”
“One of these days,” said Grandpapa, with cautious vagueness, “you
may read me one of your stories, and we shall see what we shall
see; but you mustn’t expect to make a living by writing books,
Lyddie. That’s a thing that’s only done by hard work.”
“What sort of hard work?”
“There’s very little hard work that women are fit for. They can go
governessing, or school teaching, or nurse in hospitals. Your Aunt
Beryl had a fancy that way once, but I told her she’d get as much
nursing as she wanted at home, all in good time, and you see I was
quite right.”
“Did Aunt Evelyn want to do something, too?”
“She wanted to get married, my dear, and so she took the first young
fellow that came after her. Never you do that, Lyddie.”
Lydia raised surprised eyes to the old man’s face.
“Well, well,” said Grandpapa soothingly, “you’ve got twice the brains
of any of them, we know that. You get them from your mother. Not
that brains ever did her any good, poor soul—she was unbalanced,
as clever women generally are.”
“Am I unbalanced, Grandpapa?”
“Now that’s a bad habit,” said Grandpapa, suddenly extending a
gnarled forefinger like a little twisted bit of old ivory, as though about
to lay it on some objectionable insect. “That’s a very bad habit,
Lyddie, me dear. Don’t refer everything back to yourself. It bores
people. Do it in your own mind,” said Grandpapa, chuckling; “no
doubt you won’t be able to help it—but not out loud. When someone
tells you that Mrs. Smith dresses better than she walks, don’t
immediately go and say, like nine women out of every ten, ‘Do I
dress better than I walk?’”
Grandpapa assumed a piping falsetto designed to simulate a
feminine voice: “And don’t say, either, ‘Oh, that reminds me of what
was said about me this time nine years ago.’ People don’t want to
hear about you—they want to hear about themselves.”
“Always, Grandpapa?” said Lydia, dismayed.
“Practically always, and when you’ve grasped that, you’ve got the
secret of success. Always let the other people talk about
themselves.”
Lydia’s memory was a retentive one, and to the end of her life, at the
oddest, most unexpected moments, Grandpapa’s aphorism,
delivered in the very tones of his cracked, sardonic old voice, was
destined to return to her, always with increased appreciation of its
cynical penetration into the weakness of human nature:
“Always let the other people talk about themselves.”
With the advent of Aunt Beryl and the lamp, needless to say,
Grandpapa ceased imparting these educational items to Lydia.
He listened to Aunt Beryl’s account of Mrs. Jackson’s asthma,
agreed that Uncle George was late back from the office, and became
deaf and vacant-eyed when Aunt Beryl reproachfully said that
Shamrock had brought a live crab into the front hall, and upset the
girl’s temper. At seven o’clock, Aunt Beryl and Lydia went away to
don evening blouses, and, in the case of Aunt Beryl, a “dressy” black
silk skirt, and half an hour later they all had supper in the dining-
room.
Once a week, Wednesdays, Mr. Monteagle Almond, from the Bank,
used to come in at nine o’clock and play chess with Uncle George.
He told Lydia once that he had never missed a Wednesday evening,
except when either or both were away, during the last fifteen years.
“And I don’t suppose,” solemnly said Mr. Almond, “I shall miss one
for the next fifteen—not if we’re both spared.”
He was a dried-up-looking little man, with a thin beard and a nearly
bald head, and both Uncle George and Aunt Beryl chaffed him
facetiously from time to time on the subject of getting married, but
Mr. Monteagle Almond never retaliated by turning the tables on
them, as Lydia privately considered that he might well have done.
On the evenings when Mr. Almond was not present, Aunt Beryl very
often took off her shoes and rested her feet, which were always
causing her pain, against the rung of a chair. Sometimes, when
Gertrude had cleared away, she hung over the dining-room table,
spread with paper patterns and rolls of material, and after hovering
undecidedly for a long while, would suddenly pounce on her largest
pair of scissors and begin to slash away with every appearance of
recklessness. But the recklessness was always justified when the
dress or the blouse was finished. She was never too much absorbed
to remember Lydia’s bedtime, however, and at nine o’clock every
night Lydia was expected to rouse Grandpapa from the light slumber
into which he would never admit that he had fallen, Uncle George
from the newspaper or “Applied Mechanics,” and shake hands with
them gravely as she said good night.
Only the game of chess might not be interrupted.
Aunt Beryl always came up to say good night to Lydia in her nice
little room at the top of the house.
“Sure you’re quite warm enough, dear?”
“Yes, quite, thank you, auntie.”
“There’s another blanket whenever you want one. You’ve only to say.
Have you said your prayers?”
“Yes.”
“And brushed your teeth?”
“Yes, auntie.”
“Good night, dearie. Sleep well.”
Aunt Beryl tucked her up and kissed her, and sometimes she said:
“Sleep on your back and tuck in the clothes, and then the fleas won’t
bite your toes.”
Then she went downstairs again, and Lydia never heard her and
Uncle George going up to bed, for Grandpapa always refused to stir
before twelve o’clock, and sometimes later, and it was necessary
that both of them should wait so as to keep him company and
eventually take him up to his room. The only variety in the week was
Sunday, and even Sundays had their own routine. A later breakfast
and a morning in church were succeeded by a heavy midday meal
and a somnolent afternoon for Aunt Beryl and Grandpapa. Uncle
George very often took Lydia for a long walk, in the course of which
he became more than ever like Mr. Barlow, and would suddenly,
while crossing the railway bridge, propound such inquiries as:
“Now, what do you suppose is meant by the word Tare, on the left-
hand bottom corner of those trucks?”
Lydia very seldom knew the answer to these conundrums, but
whether she did or no, she was sufficiently aware that no scientific
precision of reply on her part would have given her uncle half the
satisfaction that it did to enlighten her ignorance. Accordingly, she
generally said demurely:
“I’ve often wondered, Uncle George. I should like to know what it
means.”
She always listened to Uncle George’s accurate and painstaking
explanations and tried to remember them. Suspecting extraordinary
deficiencies in Aunt Beryl’s system of education, she was genuinely
desirous of supplementing them whenever she could.
Her ambitions to acquire learning, accomplishments, and the
achievement of extreme personal beauty, all of which seemed to her
to be equally far from realization, were Lydia’s only troubles at
Regency Terrace.
On the former questions she had determined to approach either her
uncle or her grandfather after Christmas. Not before, Lydia shrewly
decided, or they would say that she was in too great a hurry, that she
had not yet had a fair trial of the system of regular lessons at home.
In foresight and appraisement of valuation where the touchstone of
what she considered to be her own best interest was concerned,
Lydia’s judgment and calm, unchildlike tenacity of purpose might
have been envied by a financier. But to the question of her own
appearance, she brought all the ridiculous finality, childish vanity and
exaggeration, of twelve-year-old femininity. She spent a long time in
front of her small looking-glass, almost every day, staring at her little
pointed face, seeking desperately for traces of beauty in her olive
skin and straight brows and wishing that her eyes were blue, or
brown, or even grey—anything except a dark, variable sort of hazel.
The only satisfaction she got was from the contemplation of her hair,
which was long and dark and very thick. Aunt Beryl made her wear it
in two plaits, during the day-time, but Lydia did not dislike this; as the
plaits undone and carefully brushed out in the evenings, gave a
momentary wave to the perfectly straight mass.
Lydia brushed it off her forehead and fastened it back with a round
comb, and thought that she looked rather like the pictures of “Alice
Through the Looking-Glass.”
She was tall for her age, which was another source of satisfaction,
but the length of her slim hands and feet were a terrible portent of
inordinate future growth, and Aunt Beryl, with a foresight
unappreciated by her niece, insisted upon a precautionary and
unsightly tuck in all Lydia’s garments.
But in spite of the tucks, and the frequent east wind, and Aunt Beryl’s
lessons, and the complete absence of any society of her own age,
Lydia liked Regency Terrace very much.
She had an odd appreciation for the security implied by the very
monotony of each day as it slipped by. With her mother there had
been no security at all. They had come from China when Lydia was
five, and she could only just remember a little about the voyage, and
the terrible parting from her Amah. After that, they had been in
London, sometimes at a boarding-house sometimes in rooms, once
in a big hotel where Lydia had had her first alarming, unforgettable
experience of going up and downstairs in a lift. When Lydia was six,
and her father had gone back to China, she and her mother had
stayed first with one relation and then with another, and none of the
visits had been very comfortable nor successful. Lydia’s mother had
cried and said that no one understood the sort of thing she was used
to in Hong Kong, and what a dreadful change it was for her to be
without a man to look after her.
Lydia, a detached and solemn little girl, had retained from those
early years a dislike of scenes and tears, and self-pitying rhapsodies,
that was to remain with her for the rest of her life.
They were in London when Lydia’s mother became a widow and the
next three years had been worse than ever.
Lydia was sent to stay with Aunt Evelyn, and then, just as she was
beginning to feel rather more at home with her noisy, teasing
cousins, her mother fetched her away again and they went to rooms
in Hampstead. But the landlady there objected to the number of
times that Lydia’s mother asked her friends, although only one at a
time, to come and have supper and spend the evening. The two
ladies would sit up very late, while Lydia’s mother talked of all that
made her unhappy, and generally cried a great deal, and very often,
even after the visitor had gone, would come and wake Lydia up by
kneeling at her bedside and sobbing there.
From Hampstead, her mother went as paying guest to a family in
West Kensington and Lydia was sent to a boarding-school. She
never forgot the mortification of her mother’s sudden descent upon
her, when she had been there nearly a whole term, to say that she
had come to take her away.
“But she’s getting on so well!” the head mistress, whom Lydia liked,
had protested. “You’re very happy with us, aren’t you, dear?”
“Yes,” Lydia had muttered miserably, and with only too much truth.
She had been happier than ever before, and had made friends with
other little girls, and enjoyed the games they played, and the
interesting lessons. And she had felt almost sure of getting a prize at
the end of the year. But she knew with a dreadful certainty that if she
showed her great reluctance to leaving school, and her
disappointment and humiliation at being taken away without rhyme
or reason, her mother would have a fit of the tempestuous crying that
Lydia so dreaded, and would say how heartless it was of her little girl
not to want to come home, “now that they only had each other.” So
she swallowed very hard, and looked down on the floor, clenching
her hands, and made hardly any protest at all. Her only comfort was
that her mother’s impetuosity, which could never wait, insisted upon
her immediate departure. And Lydia was glad to avoid any farewells,
with the astonished questions and comments that must have
accompanied them.
She felt that she could never bear to see the nice Kensington school
again.
After that she had lessons or holidays as seemed good to her
mother, and very seldom spent a consecutive three months in the
same place. No wonder that Regency Terrace, unaltered in half a
century, seemed a very haven of refuge to Mrs. Raymond’s child.
 III
Experience has to be bought, generally at the cost of some
humiliating youthful mistakes. Those who profit by these unpleasant
transactions early in life may be congratulated.
Lydia, the anxious diplomatist, so acutely desirous of keeping in the
good graces of those who had control of her destiny, found that she
had made a mistake in approaching Grandpapa privately upon the
momentous subject.
Grandpapa, indeed, had received her carefully-thought-out
explanation with not too bad a grace.
“So you don’t think you’re learning enough, eh, Lyddie? D’you think
you know more than Aunt Beryl already?”
Lydia had nearly cried.
“No, Grandpapa,” she began in the horrified accents of outraged
conventionality, when she remembered in time Grandpapa’s
uncanny faculty for penetrating to one’s real true, inmost opinion.
“Not more,” she said boldly, “but I know as much of Little Arthur’s
History as there is in the book, and auntie can’t take me any further
in French or fractions, and she never has time to give me proper
music lessons. I only do scales, and Weber’s Last Valse, by myself.
And I can feel I’m not getting on, Grandpapa—and I do so want to.”
“Why?”
“I’ve got to earn my own living,” said Lydia, rather proud of the
words, “and besides, I’m going to write books.”
“Can you spell?”
“Yes, Grandpapa.”
“You’ll be the first woman of my acquaintance that could, then,” said
Grandpapa unbelievingly.
“But there are heaps of other things I ought to know besides
spelling,” she urged.
“Well, I suppose that’s true. But what is it you want to do? I won’t pay
for a Madame to come and parlyvoo every day,” said Grandpapa in
sarcastic allusion to a recent flight on the part of Aunt Beryl’s friends,
the Jacksons.
“Would it be very expensive to let me go to school for a little bit,
Grandpapa?”
“What, and come back a great hulking tomboy, all muddy boots, and
scratched hands like your cousins?”
There was less opposition than Lydia had expected in his manner,
and she began to plead eagerly.
“I wouldn’t, truly I wouldn’t—I needn’t play games at all. It’s only for
the lessons I want to go. Beatrice and Olive only like it for the
hockey, they hate their lessons. But I would work all the time,
Grandpapa, and bring back heaps of prizes.”
“Mind, if I let you go at all, it would be only as a day boarder,” said
Grandpapa warningly. But there was more than a hint of concession
in his tone.
“That’s all I want,” said Lydia.
“I’ll think it over, and talk to your aunt. Now go and fetch me to-day’s
paper.”
Grandpapa occasionally made a feint of reading the newspaper to
himself, although he was never seen to turn over a page.
“I can’t, Grandpapa. Aunt Beryl took it away, but she is going to bring
it back this evening.”
“You can’t?” said Grandpapa in a voice that contrived to be terrible,
although it was so small and high-pitched: “Don’t talk nonsense!
There’s no such thing as can’t. There’s won’t, if you like.”
Lydia felt very much distressed. Grandpapa’s anger and contempt
were not pleasant at any time, and just now when he appeared so
nearly disposed to grant her heart’s desire, she was less than ever
wishful of incurring them.
“Aunt Beryl has lent the paper to Mrs. Jackson for something,” she
faltered, feeling much disposed to cry. “She said you were sure not
to want it before to-night.”
“Quite wrong. I want it at once. Now don’t say can’t again,” said
Grandpapa sharply.
The unfortunate Lydia looked helplessly at her tyrant.
“There’s no such thing as can’t,” said Grandpapa truculently. “Just
you take hold of that and don’t you ever forget it. Never place any
reliance on a person who says can’t. Let ’em say they won’t—or they
don’t want to—that may be true. The other isn’t. Anybody can do
anything, if they only make up their minds to it.”
Grandpapa and his descendant faced one another in silence for a
minute or so across the echo of this Spartan theory. At last the old
man said contemptuously:
“If you haven’t learnt that yet, you’re not ready for any more
schooling than we can give you here, I can tell you.”
It was as Lydia had feared!
The future of one’s education, the whole of one’s career in fact, was
at stake.
Lydia gulped at an enormous lump in her throat and managed to
articulate with sufficient determination:
“I’ll fetch it.”
Then she hurried out of the room, wondering what on earth she
should do next.
Rush out and buy another paper?
The shops were a long way off, and very likely the morning papers
might be all sold out.
The station book stall?
That again was open to the same objections.
Borrow one from somebody else?
But whom?
Suddenly Lydia caught her breath.
Why not? It seemed obvious, once one had thought of it.
She hastily put on her hat, left the front door ajar behind her, and
walked out into the road and down a street that ran at an angle to
Regency Terrace.
“If you please, Mr. Raymond would be glad to have the morning
paper back again if Mrs. Jackson has quite finished with it,” she said
politely, relieved that it was late enough in the day for “the girl” to
open the door of the Jackson establishment to her, instead of one of
the family.
Five minutes later she was again confronting Grandpapa, this time
feeling triumphant and highly pleased with herself.
“I’ve got it, Grandpapa!”
Grandpapa’s claw-like old hand shot out and snatched at the
newspaper.
“What’s the date on it?” he demanded.
Lydia read it aloud.
“That’s to-day’s all right.”
“I went round and asked——” began Lydia, desirous of exploiting her
resourcefulness.
“That’ll do, me dear. Never spoil an achievement by a long story
about it,” said Grandpapa. “I asked for the paper and you’ve brought
it. That’s quite enough.”
“Yes, Grandpapa,” said Lydia submissively.
Grandpapa pointed the moral no further but Lydia had unconsciously
added another paragraph to the Book of Rules which was to guide
her throughout the mysterious game that was just beginning for her:
“There’s no such thing as can’t.”
She heard nothing more for the next few days of her ambitious
request to be sent to school, and was far too cautious to risk a
peremptory refusal through importunity.
It was a week later that she became uncomfortably aware of an
indefinable alteration in her aunt’s manner towards her.
“Is anything the matter, auntie?” she gently ventured.
“Why should anything be the matter, dear?” said Aunt Beryl, her lips
very close together and her gaze not meeting Lydia’s.
The child’s heart sank.
Quite obviously Aunt Beryl was offended, and meant to adopt the
trying policy of ignoring any cause for offence. Twice she was too
tired to come upstairs and say good night to Lydia, although this had
never happened before, and several times when Lydia made little
obvious comments, of the sort that always constituted conversation
between them on their walks, Aunt Beryl appeared to be too much
absorbed in thought to have heard her.
“I would much rather be scolded,” reflected Lydia dismally.
She was not scolded, but Aunt Beryl’s sense of grievance presently
passed into a more articulate stage.
“Oh, don’t ask me, dear. I’m nobody. I don’t know anything,” she
suddenly exclaimed with extreme bitterness, on a request for advice
in respect of Lydia’s knitting.
“Oh, auntie! are you angry?”
“Why should I be angry, dear? I may be grieved, but that’s another
matter.”
On this ground Aunt Beryl finally took her stand.
“I’m not angry, dear—I’m grieved.”
And grieved Aunt Beryl remained, tacitly waving away all Lydia’s
timid attempts at apology or explanation.
Could anything be better calculated to make one feel thoroughly
remorseful and uncomfortable?
Lydia, however, characteristically felt more resentful than remorseful.
The tension of the situation was slightly relieved one evening, greatly
to Lydia’s surprise, by Mr. Monteagle Almond.
“So you’re being sent to school, young lady?” he remarked quietly,
making Lydia jump.
“Oh, am I?”
“You ought to know. I understand that a certain young lady, not a
hundred miles away from where we are now, asked to be sent to
school, so that she might grow very learned. Isn’t that so?”
“I should like to go to school,” faltered Lydia.
“Very natural,” said Mr. Almond indulgently. “Companions of your
own age attract you, no doubt. What would childhood be without
other children, eh, George? You remember?”
“I was not so well provided as you were, Monty,” said Uncle George
rather resentfully.
“Indeed, no. Are you aware, young lady, that I was one of a family of
fifteen?”
Aunt Beryl made a clicking sound with her tongue.
“Yes, Miss Raymond, fifteen. My father and mother were old-
fashioned people, and held that each child carried a blessing with it.
Three died in infancy, and a young brother was lost at sea.
Otherwise I’m thankful to say that we are all spared to this day.”
“Fancy!” said Aunt Beryl in a flat voice.
“Fifteen children,” repeated the grey-bearded clerk, “and my mother
kept her figure to the last day of her life. A lesson to the young wives
of to-day, I often think.”
“Your bedtime, Lydia,” said Aunt Beryl briskly. “Go upstairs now and
I’ll come and put the light out.”