And when the blithe Maud passed through the parlour on the way to bed, she saw two dignified and apparently calm ladies, apparently absorbed in a delightful game of cards, apparently without a worry in the world.
They said
"Good night, Maud," cheerfully, politely, and coldly.
It was a heroic scene.
Immediately afterwards Sophia carried Fossette up to her own bedroom.
II
The next afternoon the sisters, in the drawing-room, saw Dr. Stirling's motor-car speeding down the Square.
The doctor's partner, young Harrop, had died a few years before at the age of over seventy, and the practice was much larger than it had ever been, even in the time of old Harrop.
Instead of two or three horses, Stirling kept a car, which was a constant spectacle in the streets of the district.
"I do hope he'll call in," said Mrs. Povey, and sighed.
Sophia smiled to herself with a little scorn.
She knew that Constance's desire for Dr. Stirling was due simply to the need which she felt of telling some one about the great calamity that had happened to them that morning.
Constance was utterly absorbed by it, in the most provincial way.
Sophia had said to herself at the beginning of her sojourn in Bursley, and long afterwards, that she should never get accustomed to the exasperating provinciality of the town, exemplified by the childish preoccupation of the inhabitants with their own two-penny affairs.
No characteristic of life in Bursley annoyed her more than this.
None had oftener caused her to yearn in a brief madness for the desert-like freedom of great cities.
But she had got accustomed to it.
Indeed, she had almost ceased to notice it.
Only occasionally, when her nerves were more upset than usual, did it strike her.
She went into Constance's bedroom to see whether the doctor's car halted in King Street.
It did.
"He's here," she called out to Constance.
"I wish you'd go down, Sophia," said Constance.
"I can't trust that minx----"
So Sophia went downstairs to superintend the opening of the door by the minx.
The doctor was radiant, according to custom.
"I thought I'd just see how that dizziness was going on," said he as he came up the steps.
"I'm glad you've come," said Sophia, confidentially. Since the first days of their acquaintanceship they had always been confidential.
"You'll do my sister good to-day."
Just as Maud was closing the door a telegraph-boy arrived, with a telegram addressed to Mrs. Scales.
Sophia read it and then crumpled it in her hand.
"What's wrong with Mrs. Povey to-day?" the doctor asked, when the servant had withdrawn.
"She only wants a bit of your society," said Sophia.
"Will you go up?
You know the way to the drawing-room.
I'll follow."
As soon as he had gone she sat down on the sofa, staring out of the window.
Then with a grunt:
"Well, that's no use, anyway!" she went upstairs after the doctor.
Already Constance had begun upon her recital.
"Yes," Constance was saying. "And when I went down this morning to keep an eye on the breakfast, I thought Spot was very quiet--" She paused.
"He was dead in the drawer.
She pretended she didn't know, but I'm sure she did.
Nothing will convince me that she didn't poison that dog with the mice-poison we had last year.
She was vexed because Sophia took her up sharply about Fossette last night, and she revenged herself on the other dog.
It would just be like her.
Don't tell me!
I know.
I should have packed her off at once, but Sophia thought better not.
We couldn't prove anything, as Sophia says.