“You can sleep here to-night,” announced Aunt May. “We shall have a meal all together soon after sunset. Till then you can talk to my sister, who’s an invalid. She’s always eager for news.”
She took charge of them as if she were the matron of a workhouse receiving new inmates.
“You’d better bring your truck into the garden,” she said, “or Alice will be turning everything over. Inquisitive brute!” she added, snapping her fingers at the cow, who had returned, and stood within a few feet of them, eyeing the Goslings with a slow, dull wonder—a mournfully sleepy beast whose furiously wakeful tail seemed anxious to rouse its owner out of her torpor.
The invalid sister sat by the window of a small room that faced west and overlooked the luxuriance of what was still recognizably a flower-garden.
“My sister, Mrs Pollard,” said Aunt May sharply, and then addressing the woman who sat huddled in shawls by the window, she added: “Three more strays, Fanny—from London, Allie tells me.” She went out quickly, closing the door with a vigour which indicated little tolerance for invalid nerves.
Mrs Pollard stretched out a delicate white hand. “Please come and sit near me,” she said, “and tell me about London. It is so long since I have had any news from there. Perhaps you might be able——” she broke off, and looked at the three strangers with a certain pathetic eagerness.
“I’ll take me bonnet off, ma’am, if you’ll excuse me,” remarked Mrs Gosling. She felt at home once more within the delightful shelter of a house, although slightly overawed by the aspect of the room and its occupant. About both there was an air of that class dignity to which Mrs Gosling knew she could never attain. “I don’t know when I’ve felt the ’eat as I ’ave to-day,” she remarked politely.
“Has it been hot?” asked Mrs Pollard. “To me the days all seem so much alike. I want you to tell me, were there any young men in London when you left? You haven’t seen any young man who at all resembles this photograph, have you?”
Mrs Gosling stared at the silver-framed photograph which Mrs Pollard took from the table at her side, stared and shook her head.
“We haven’t seen a single man of any kind for two months,” said Blanche, “not a single one. Have we, Millie?”