She sat quite still for several moments, feeling acutely a great many things she had scarcely divined before. Then presently she glanced over her shoulder at the great vats towering out of the darkness behind her. They suddenly presented themselves to her imagination as a symbol, a visible sign of the weight of society bearing down upon the poor, crushing out goodness and happiness and hope. As she watched them with half-fascinated eyes, they seemed to swell and grow until they dominated the whole room with the sense of their oppressiveness. She rose with a little shiver and almost ran to the door.
‘Let’s go!’ she cried.
‘What’s the matter?’ he asked, looking at her face.
‘Nothing. I want to go. It’s stopped raining.’
He led out the horses and helped her to mount.
‘What’s the matter?’ he asked again, ‘Your hand is trembling. Did I say anything to frighten you?’
She shook her head without answering, and when they reached the road she drew a long breath of fresh air and glanced back with a nervous laugh.
‘I had the most horrible feeling in there! I felt as if something were going to reach out from those vats and grab me from behind.’
‘I think,’ he suggested, ‘that you’d better take some of your aunt’s quinine when you get home.’
‘Mr. Sybert,’ she said presently, ‘I told you one day that I thought poor people were picturesque, I don’t think so any more.’