"And I know you by sight," went on Mrs. Wilkins, who, like all
the shy, once she was started; lunged on, frightening herself to more
and more speech by the sheer sound of what she had said last in her
ears. "Every Sunday--I see you every Sunday in church--"
"In church?" echoed Mrs. Arbuthnot.
"And this seems such a wonderful thing--this advertisement about
the wisteria--and--"
Mrs. Wilkins, who must have been at least thirty, broke off and
wriggled in her chair with the movement of an awkward and embarrassed
schoolgirl.
"It seems so wonderful," she went on in a kind of burst, "and--it
is such a miserable day . . ."
And then she sat looking at Mrs. Arbuthnot with the eyes of an
imprisoned dog.
"This poor thing," thought Mrs. Arbuthnot, whose life was spent
in helping and alleviating, "needs advice."
She accordingly prepared herself patiently to give it.
"If you see me in church," she said, kindly and attentively, "I
suppose you live in Hampstead too?"
"Oh yes," said Mrs. Wilkins. And she repeated, her head on its
long thin neck drooping a little as if the recollection of Hampstead
bowed her, "Oh yes."
"Where?" asked Mrs. Arbuthnot, who, when advice was needed,
naturally first proceeded to collect the facts.
But Mrs. Wilkins, laying her hand softly and caressingly on the
part of The Times where the advertisement was, as though the mere
printed words of it were precious, only said, "Perhaps that is why this
seems so wonderful.
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