"Go and make sure."
Janet went to the door, and came back.
"It is shut."
"Kneel down by me. I can't speak loud."
Janet knelt down.
"Now listen to me. I'm dying. I'm not going to die this minute, because I won't; but all the same it's coming. I can't hold on. There is no time for being surprised, or for explanations. There's no time for anything, except for you to listen to me, and do something for me quickly. Will you do it?"
"Yes," said Janet.
Cuckoo looked for a moment at the innocent, fair face above her, and a faint colour stained her cheek. But she remembered her husband, and summoned her old courage. She spoke quickly, with the clearness and precision which had made her such an excellent woman of business, so invaluable on the committees of fashionable charities.
"I am a bad woman, Janet. I have concealed it from you, and from every one. Arthur—has never guessed it. Don't shudder. Don't turn away. There's not time. Keep all that for later—when I'm gone. And don't drive me to distraction by thinking this is a dying hallucination. I know what I am saying, and I, who have lied so often, am driven to speak the truth at last."