"My sister alludes to the drains. It is a sore point, canon," said Miss Crewys. "In my opinion, it is all this modern drainage that sets up typhoid fever, and nothing else."
"Bless me!" said the canon.
"Our poor Mary has grown so dependent on John, however, that she will hear nothing against him. One has to mind one's p's and q's," said Lady Belstone.
"He planned the alterations in this very hall," said Miss Crewys, "and the only excuse he offered, so far as I could understand, was that it would amuse poor Mary to carry them out."
"Does a widow wish to be amused?" said Lady Belstone, indignantly.
"And was she amused, dear lady?" asked the canon, anxiously.
"When she saw our horror and dismay she smiled."
"Did you call that a smile, Georgina? I called it a laugh. It takes almost nothing to make her laugh nowadays."
"You would not wish her to be too melancholy," said the canon, almost pleadingly; "one so—so charming, so—"
"Canon Birch," said Lady Belstone, in awful tones, "she is a widow."