Judith half-saw half-imagined the flash of a head under the lamp as she fled past. If that voice ... that voice had the sun in it?
She went on downstairs, looked for the fifth time in the box labelled E for letters addressed to herself, knew for the fifth time there could be none, and went on again, wandering among the ground-floor corridors; desired in sudden panic to get back to her room and found she had lost her way.
A girl came out of a door carrying a hot water can. She wore a pink flannel dressing-gown.
‘Could you tell me,’ asked Judith. ‘How to get to a corridor called C?’
The girl looked at her closely and then beamed behind her glasses.
‘Oh, Miss Earle! Of course! We were up together for Scholarship Exams. Come in.’
Judith, helplessly conscious that this unpleasant dream was becoming a definite nightmare, followed her.
‘Sit down,’ said the girl. ‘I’m so glad you came to find me. You remember my name—Mabel Fuller.’
O God! The creature thought she had been singled out for the purpose of soliciting friendship....
‘I am so very glad you came to see me. I dare say you feel very strange?’