"There is nothing dreadful about it," said I; "and do you mean to say that the sisters of the House of Martha, who go out to nurse, and do all sorts of good deeds, never speak to the people they are befriending, nor allow them to look upon their faces?"
"Of course," said she, "you have to talk to sick people; otherwise how could you know what they need? But this is a different case;" and she began to gather up her hair and twist it at the back of her head.
"I do not understand," I remarked; "why is it a different case?"
"It is as different as it can be," said she, picking up her comb from the floor and thrusting it through her hastily twisted knot of hair. "I should not have come here at all if your grandmother had not positively asserted that there would be nothing for me to do but to listen and to write. And Mother Anastasia and Sister Sarah both of them especially instructed me that I was not to speak to you nor to look at you, but simply to sit at the table and work for the good of the cause. That was all I had to do; and I am sure I obeyed just as strictly as anybody could, except once, when you forgot the name of Eza, and I was so anxious to have you go on with the incident that I could not help mentioning it. And now, I am sure I don't know what I ought to do."
"Do?" I asked. "There is nothing to do except to begin writing where you left off. The wasp is dead."
"I wish it had never been born," she said. "I have no doubt that the whole affair should come to an end now, and that I ought to go home; but I can't do that until Sister Sarah comes to unlock the door, and so I suppose we had better go to work."
"We"! I would not have dared to use that word, but it fell from her lips in the easiest and most conventional manner possible. It was delightful to hear it. I never knew before what a pleasant sound the word had. She now set herself to work to gather up the papers from the floor, and, having arranged them in their proper order, she took up her bonnet.
"Do you have to wear that?" I asked.
"Certainly," she answered, clapping it on and pulling it well forward.
"I should think it would be very hot and uncomfortable," I remarked.