"I presume we'd better take her to the hospital," he said in that short way. "She's been—horribly treated. She's going to need attention—and doubtless it would be disagreeable to have her here."
That too she suspected him of finding a satisfaction in saying. She made a curt inquiry as to whether the girl would be all right there for the night. He said yes and left saying he would be back in the morning.
She escaped Mrs. Hughes—whom now she understood. She did not go up again to see Lily; she could not do that then. She was angry with herself for being unnerved. She told herself that at any other time she would have been able to deal sensibly with such a situation. But coming just when things were all opened up like that—old feeling fresh—and coming from Deane Franklin! She would be quite impersonal, rational, in the morning. But for a long time she could not go to sleep. Something had intruded into her guarded places. And the things of life from which she had withdrawn were here—in her house. It affected her physically, almost made her sick—this proximity of the things she had shut out of her life. It was invasion.
And she thought about Lily. She tried not to, but could not help wondering about her. She wondered how this had happened—what the girl was feeling. Was there someone she loved? She lay there thinking of how, just recently, this girl who lived in her house had been going through those things. It made her know that the things of life were all the time around one. There was something singularly disturbing in the thought.
Next morning she went up to see Lily. She told herself it was only common decency to do that, her responsibility to a person in her house.
As she opened the door Lily turned her head and looked at her. When she saw who it was her eyes went sullen, defiant. But pain was in them too, and with all the rest something wistful. As she looked at the girl lying there—in trouble, in pain, she could see Lily, just a little while before, laughing and singing at her work. Something she had not felt in years, that she had felt but little in her whole life, stirred in her heart.
"Well, Lily," she said, uncertainly but not unkindly.
The girl's eyes were down, her face turned a little away. But she could see that her chin was quivering.
"I'm sorry you are ill," Mrs. Williams murmured, and then gave a little start at the sound of her own voice.
The girl turned her head and stole a look. A moment later there were tears on her lashes.