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Maddack sank down on to the sofa. "Come?" Mrs. Baines repeated. "Of course she's not come! What do you mean, sister?" "The very moment she got Constance's letter yesterday, saying you were ill in bed and she'd better come over to help in the shop, she started. I got Bratt's dog-cart for her." Mrs. Baines in her turn also sank down on to the sofa. "I've not been ill," she said.
They worried her like a late fly in autumn. For she had said nothing to any one about Constance's case, Mrs. Maddack of course excepted. She had instinctively felt that she could not show the slightest leniency towards the romantic impulses of her elder daughter without seeming unjust to the younger, and she had acted accordingly. On the memorable morn of Mr.
Constance's eye followed him as far as the door, where their glances met for an instant in the transient gaze which expresses the tenderness of people who feel more than they kiss. It was on the morning of this day that Mrs. Baines, relinquishing the sovereignty of St. Luke's Square, had gone to live as a younger sister in the house of Harriet Maddack at Axe.
"He didn't come all the way here?" "No'm. He happened to say last night when he got back as Miss Sophia had told him to set her down at Knype Station." "I thought so!" said Mrs. Maddack, courageously. "Yes'm." "Sister!" she moaned, after carefully shutting the door. They clung to each other.
Povey was busy there, and in Aunt Harriet's all-seeing glance he came next after the dishes. She rose from the kitchen to speak with him. "You've got your boxes of gloves all ready?" she questioned him. "Yes, Mrs. Maddack." "You'll not forget to have a measure handy?" "No, Mrs. Maddack." "You'll find you'll want more of seven-and-three-quarters and eights than anything." "Yes.
The fact was that he was not regarded as good enough. Mrs. Maddack had certainly deemed that he was not good enough. He was a solid mass of excellent qualities; but he lacked brilliance, importance, dignity. He could not impose himself. Such had been the verdict. And now, while Mrs. Baines was secretly reproaching Mr.
"I shall fetch Constance and Sophia," said Mrs. Maddack, with tears in her voice. "Do you go into the drawing-room, sister." But Mrs. Maddack only succeeded in fetching Constance. Then there was the sound of wheels in King Street. The long rite of the funeral was about to begin. Every guest, after having been measured and presented with a pair of the finest black kid gloves by Mr.
Harriet Maddack had passed away, after an operation, leaving her house and her money to her sister. The solemn rite of her interment had deeply affected all the respectability of the town of Axe, where the late Mr. Maddack had been a figure of consequence; it had even shut up the shop in St. Luke's Square for a whole day.
Mrs. Maddack opened the door with a tragic gesture. "Bladen," she called in a loud voice to the driver of the waggonette, who was standing on the pavement. "Yes'm." "It was Pember drove Miss Sophia yesterday, wasn't it?" "Yes'm." She hesitated. A clumsy question might enlighten a member of the class which ought never to be enlightened about one's private affairs.
I have allowed for that." "If you place yourself behind the side-door and put your boxes on the harmonium, you'll be able to catch every one as they come in." "That is what I had thought of, Mrs. Maddack." She went upstairs. Mrs. Baines had reached the showroom again, and was smoothing out creases in the white damask cloth and arranging glass dishes of jam at equal distances from each other.
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