midnight
Here was another new sensation -- a household without bickerings . The elder Mrs. Percival , having accepted the situation , was no niggard in her spirit of courtesy , but very gracious as was her wont , and Lena was astonished to find that she and her new mother-in-law ran their respective lines without collisions . The half-invalid older woman breakfasted in her own room and occupied herself with quiet readings and sewings and drivings , but when she did appear on the family horizon , it was always as a beneficent presence . Lena purred in the presence of comfort ; but when you see a kitten serenely snoozing before the fire , it does not do to leap to the conclusion that this kitten would not know what was expected of her on the back fence at midnight . If storm and stress should ever come , Dick had himself helped her to feel that beauty would fill the measure , wherever it fell short ; that however she might sin , beauty was her sufficient apology . Mrs. Quincy , established in a little flat with a middle-aged submissive slavey , was as nearly reconciled to fate as her nature would allow . Her rooms were pleasantly furnished , but Lena 's mother was full of the genius of discord , and almost automatically she so rearranged her surroundings that each particular article made strife with its neighbor .