julia. Martha, would you like to go upstairs with your things? And you, Laura?

martha. I will presently, when I've got warm.

laura. Not yet. Martha, why was I put into that odious shaped coffin? More like a canoe than anything. I said it was to be straight.

martha. I'd nothing to do with it, Laura. I wasn't there. You know I wasn't.

laura. If you'd come when I asked you, you could have seen to it.

martha. You didn't tell me you were dying.

laura. Do people tell each other when they are dying? They don't know. I told you I wasn't well.

martha. You always told me that, just when I'd settled down somewhere else. . . . Of course I'd have come if I'd known! (testily).

julia. Oh, surely we needn't go into these matters now! Isn't it better to accept things?

laura. I like to have my wishes attended to. What was going to be done about the furniture? (This to Martha.) You know, I suppose, that I left it to the two of you—you and Edwin?