“Do tell me. I don’t in the least mind if she was. How furious she would be with me now, and how she would gather her scanty skirts and pass me by in scornful silence.” Mrs. North laughed, an almost shrill laugh that seemed to be born of sorrow and pain. She was very strange, Florence thought, and her manner was oddly altered. “Do tell me,” she asked again—“was she very angry?”
“I am ashamed to say that she never knew you had paid it.”
“You were afraid to tell her?”
“I never had a good opportunity.”
“It doesn’t matter a bit. It saved her from being worried, poor thing,—that was the chief point. So long as a thing is done, it doesn’t matter who does it—unless it’s a bad thing. It matters then very much—especially to the person who does it,” Mrs. North added, with a little bitter laugh. “The pain of it”—she stopped again, and went on suddenly, “Tell me more about Mrs. Baines. Where is she?”
“I don’t know.”
“Have you not seen her lately?”
“Not for a long time.”
“But what has become of her?”
Florence hesitated again. “I cannot tell you.”