I understand all you've got to say and I'm
sorry. But it isn't any good. You know it isn't just as well as I do."
It might have been Gwenda who spoke to him, only that Gwenda could
never have looked meek.
The Vicar had not recovered from the shock. He was convinced that
he never would recover from it. But on that Sunday he had found a
temporary oblivion, dozing in his study between two services.
There had been no scene like that with Alice. But what had passed
between the sisters had been even worse.
Mary had gone straight from the study to Ally's room. Ally was
undressing.
Ally received the news in a cruel silence. She looked coldly, sternly
almost, and steadily at Mary.
"You needn't have told me that," she said at last. "I could see what
you were doing the other night."
"What _I_ was doing?"
"Yes, you. I don't imagine Steven Rowcliffe did it"
"Really Ally--what do you suppose I did?"
"I don't know what it was. But I know you did something and I know
that--whatever it was--_I_ wouldn't have done it."
And Mary answered quietly. "If I were you, Ally, I wouldn't show my
feelings quite so plainly."
And Ally looked at her again.
"It's not _my_ feelings--" she said.
Mary reddened. "I don't know what you mean."
"You'll know, some day," Ally said and turned her back on her.
* * * * *
Mary went out, closing the door softly, as if she spared her sick
sister's unreasonably irritated nerves.
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