“Well, I’ll leave you. I expect Amy will have tea ready directly.” She went down into the kitchen. “Amy,” she said, “as soon as we’ve finished tea, light a fire in Mrs. Scales’s bedroom.”
“In the top bedroom, m’m?”
“Yes.”
Constance climbed again to her own bedroom, and shut the door. She needed a moment to herself, in the midst of this terrific affair. She sighed with relief as she removed her mantle. She thought: “At any rate we’ve met, and I’ve got her here. She’s very nice. No, she isn’t a bit altered.” She hesitated to admit that to her Sophia was the least in the world formidable. And so she said once more: “She’s very nice. She isn’t a bit altered.” And then: “Fancy her being here! She really is here.” With her perfect simplicity it did not occur to Constance to speculate as to what Sophia thought of her.
Sophia was downstairs first, and Constance found her looking at the blank wall beyond the door leading to the kitchen steps.
“So this is where you had it bricked up?” said Sophia.
“Yes,” said Constance. “That’s the place.”
“It makes me feel like people feel when they have tickling in a limb that’s been cut off!” said Sophia.
“Oh, Sophia!”
The tea received a great deal of praise from Sophia, but neither of them ate much. Constance found that Sophia was like herself: she had to be particular about her food. She tasted dainties for the sake of tasting, but it was a bird’s pecking. Not the twelfth part of the tea was consumed. They dared not indulge caprices. Only their eyes could feed.