“She's up-stairs in her room,” said Sheridan. “Roscoe—”
Sibyl interrupted. She had just seen Bibbs pass through the hall and begin to ascend the stairs; and in a flash she instinctively perceived the chance for precisely the effect she wanted.
“No, let me go,” she said. “I want to speak to her a minute first, anyway.”
And she went away quickly, gaining the top of the stairs in time to see Bibbs enter his room and close the door. Sibyl knew that Bibbs, in his room, had overheard her quarrel with Edith in the hall outside; for bitter Edith, thinking the more to shame her, had subsequently informed her of the circumstance. Sibyl had just remembered this, and with the recollection there had flashed the thought—out of her own experience—that people are often much more deeply impressed by words they overhear than by words directly addressed to them. Sibyl intended to make it impossible for Bibbs not to overhear. She did not hesitate—her heart was hot with the old sore, and she believed wholly in the justice of her cause and in the truth of what she was going to say. Fate was virtuous at times; it had delivered into her hands the girl who had affronted her.
Mrs. Sheridan was in her own room. The approach of Sibyl and Roscoe had driven her from the library, for she had miscalculated her husband's mood, and she felt that if he used his injured hand as a mark of emphasis again, in her presence, she would (as she thought of it) “have a fit right there.” She heard Sibyl's step, and pretended to be putting a touch to her hair before a mirror.
“I was just coming down,” she said, as the door opened.
“Yes, he wants you to,” said Sibyl. “It's all right, mother Sheridan. He's forgiven me.”
Mrs. Sheridan sniffed instantly; tears appeared. She kissed her daughter-in-law's cheek; then, in silence, regarded the mirror afresh, wiped her eyes, and applied powder.
“And I hope Edith will be happy,” Sibyl added, inciting more applications of Mrs. Sheridan's handkerchief and powder.
“Yes, yes,” murmured the good woman. “We mustn't make the worst of things.”