“Safe!” she wailed. “Safe! Thank God, my little lambs are safe!”
Distraught she swayed and hugged; kissed and moaned again.
David pressed away. “You smell like whisky, mummie,” he said.
It was a dash of icy water on a fainting fit; wonderfully it strung the demented woman's senses. She pushed her little lambs from her; fixed Mary with awful eye.
“So you've come back—Miss?”
Mary quivered.
“I wonder you dared. I wonder you had the boldness to face me after your wicked behaviour. You've got nothing to say for yourself. I'm not surprised—”
Mary began: “Mrs. Chater, I—”
“Oh, how can you? How can you dare defend yourself? Never, never in all my born days have I met with such ingratitude; never have I been deceived like this. I took you in. I felt sorry for you. I fed you, clothed you, cared for you, treated you as one of my own family; and this is my reward. There you stand, unable to say a word—”
“If you think, Mrs. Chater—”