"Flo, it is impious to hear your talk; it is just on a par with those
awfully clever papers of yours--those stories and those articles. You
have made a terrible sensation at Dawlish. You are becoming notorious,
my dear. It is awful for a little widow like me to have a notorious
daughter. You must stop it, Flo; you really must!"

"Come, mother, I will get you a cup of tea. What does it matter what the
Dawlish people say? You will spend the night, of course?"

"You and I, my dear, will spend some of the night in the train."

"Now, mother, what does this mean?"

"Listen, Flo. Yes, you may get me a cup of tea and a new-laid egg, if
you have such a thing."

"But I have not."

"Then a rasher of bacon done to a turn and a little bit of toast. I can
toast the bread myself. You are not at all badly off in this nice room,
but----"

"Go on, mother, go on; do explain why you have come."

"It is your aunt, dear; she is very ill indeed. She is not expected to
recover."

"What, Aunt Susan?"

"Yes, she has had a serious illness and has taken a turn for the worse.
It is double pneumonia, whatever that means. Anyhow, it is frightfully
fatal, and the doctors have no hope. I went to see her."

"When you heard she was ill, mother?"

"No, I didn't hear she was ill. I felt so desperate about you and the
extraordinary sentiments you were casting wholesale upon the world that
I could stand it no longer, and when you sent me that last cheque I
thought I would make a final appeal to Susan. So I put on my very best
black silk----"

Florence now with a quick sigh resumed her duties as tea-maker. Mrs.
Aylmer was fairly launched on her narrative.

"I put on my very best black silk--the one that nice, charming, _clever_
Miss Keys sent to me--and I told Sukey that I should be away for a
couple of days and that she was to expect me when she heard from me, and
she was _not_ to forward letters. I didn't expect any from you, and your
letters lately have been the reverse of comforting, and I started off
and got to Aylmer's Court yesterday evening. I took a cab and drove
straight there, and when the man opened the door I said: 'I am Mrs.
Aylmer; I have come to see my sister-in-law,' and of course there was
nothing for it but to let me in, although the flunkey said: 'I don't
think she is quite as bad as that, ma'am,' and I looked at him and said:
'What do you mean?' and I had scarcely uttered the words before Miss
Keys, so elegantly dressed