With these vague but direful words she disappeared, leaving Prudence collapsed, her knees trembling under her, her mind filled with the gloomiest forebodings, and an undefined terror in her breast as to what Miss Lord might know.
How she got through the rest of that dreadful day Prudence never remembered. She dreaded the ordeal of dinner; but though the medical lady had evidently told her story, and there was an atmosphere of disquiet, no direct questions were asked, so the meal passed off better than she had expected. Still, the marked avoidance of the subject of her sister’s illness was a new source of uneasiness.
“I’m sure they think she has cholera or leprosy, or that I am poisoning her,” mused Prudence dolefully, as she crumbled her bread, and a dull resentment against Augusta, who had involved her in all this trouble and deceit, smouldered in her breast.
There was an added loftiness in. Mrs. Dumaresq’s manner which showed that Miss Semaphore had somehow incurred her displeasure, while Mrs. Whitley omitted to pass her the salt and pepper, which, with fussy officiousness, she presented to everyone else.
Good-natured Miss Belcher alone, forgetting Toutou and Miss Augusta’s bad temper, came up to her as the ladies filed out of the dining-room and said,
“I hope your sister is better.”
“Yes, thank you,” replied Prudence faintly.
“How tired and pale you look. I do believe you are fagged out nursing her. Do let me help, if I can be of any use to you.”
“You cannot help me, thank you,” said Prudence, with a sudden impulse to kiss her. “She does not like anyone else to come near her.”
“Cross, tyrannical old thing,” thought little Miss Belcher, who pitied Prudence for the slavery to which she submitted from her sister.