“Who told her that Sabine had returned? How could she have discovered it?”
“The nurse doesn’t know. She must have heard some one speaking the name under her window. The nurse says that people in her condition have curious ways of discovering such things ... like a sixth sense.”
“Do you want me to ask Sabine? She’d come if I asked her.”
“It would be unpleasant. Besides, I think it might do harm in some way.”
Olivia was silent for a moment. “How? She probably wouldn’t remember Sabine. When she saw her last, Sabine was a young girl.”
“She’s gotten the idea now that we’re all against her, that we’re persecuting her in some way.” He coughed and blew a cloud of smoke out of his thin-drawn lips. “It’s difficult to explain what I mean.... I mean that Sabine might encourage that feeling ... quite without meaning to, that Sabine might give her the impression that she was an ally. There’s something disturbing about Sabine.”
“Anson thinks so, too,” said Olivia softly. “He’s been talking to me about it.”
“She ought never to have come back here. It’s difficult ... what I am trying to say. Only I feel that she’s up to some mischief. I think she hates us all.”
“Not all of us....”
“Not perhaps you. You never belonged here. It’s only those of us who have always been here.”