"Miss Lessways." It was George Cannon.
"Yes."
"I just want to speak to her if she's at liberty," said George Cannon.
Hilda cried from the ceiling: "I'll come as soon as I've--"
"Please go now," Sarah interrupted in tense accents. Hilda glanced down at her, astonished, and saw in her eyes an almost childish appeal, weak and passionate, which gripped the heart painfully.
She jumped from the chair. Sarah Gailey was now sitting on the bed. Yes, in her worn face of a woman who has definitely passed the climacteric, and in the abandoned pose of those thin arms, there was the look and gesture of a young girl desperately beseeching. Hilda was puzzled and intimidated. She had meant to be jocular, and to insist on staying till the task was finished. But she kept silence and obeyed the supplication, from a motive of prudence.
"I wouldn't keep you from him for anything," murmured Sarah Gailey tragically, as Hilda opened the door and left her sitting forlorn among all her skirts and linen.
II
"I'm here," George Cannon called out from the parlour when he heard the sound of the door. He was looking from the window up at the street; the blind had not been drawn. He turned as Hilda entered.
"You've been out!" he said, observing that she was in street attire.