that for some reason to do with her father

“Go with Rufus, dear,” her mother said, “he’s going to help you get dressed, and eat your breakfast. Mother will see you soon.” And Catherine, feeling that for some reason to do with her father, who was not where he ought to be, and her mother too, she must try to be a very good girl, came away with him without further protest. As they turned through the door to go down, Rufus saw that his mother had taken the beads and cross from the bedside table (they were like a regular necklace) and the beads ran among her fingers and twined and drooped from her hands and one wrist while she looked so intently at the upright cross that she did not realize that she had been seen. She’d be mad if she knew, he was sure. Before he did anything about Catherine he put his cap back in the tissue paper. Then he got her clothes. “Take off your nightie,” he said. “Sopping wet,” he added, as nearly like his mother as possible. “You’re sopping wet too,” she retorted. “No, I didn’t either,” he said, “not last night.” He found that she could do a certain amount of dressing herself; she got on the panties and she nearly got her underwaist on right too, except that it was backwards. “That’s all right,” he told her, as much like his mother as he was able, you do it fine. Just a little bit crooked”; and he fixed it right. He buttoned her panties to her underwaist. It was much less easy, he found, than buttoning his own clothes. “Stand still,” he said, because to tell her so seemed only a proper part of carrying out his duty. “I am,” Catherine replied, with such firmness that he said no more. That was all that either of them said before they went down to breakfast. Chapter 21 Catherine did not like being buttoned up by Rufus or bossed around by him, and breakfast wasn’t like breakfast either. Aunt Hannah didn’t say anything and neither did Rufus and neither did she, and she felt that even if she wanted to say anything she oughtn’t. Everything was queer, it was so still and it seemed dark. Aunt Hannah sliced the banana so thin on the Post Toasties it looked cold and wet and slimy.