as in the sky when she fell asleep,
and when she woke the sun was on her face.

She dressed and went down to the kitchen. Verena was there alone: she
glanced at Charity tranquilly, with her old deaf-looking eyes. There was
no sign of Mr. Royall about the house and the hours passed without his
reappearing. Charity had gone up to her room, and sat there listlessly,
her hands on her lap. Puffs of sultry air fanned her dimity window
curtains and flies buzzed stiflingly against the bluish panes.

At one o'clock Verena hobbled up to see if she were not coming down to
dinner; but she shook her head, and the old woman went away, saying:
"I'll cover up, then."

The sun turned and left her room, and Charity seated herself in the
window, gazing down the village street through the half-opened shutters.
Not a thought was in her mind; it was just a dark whirlpool of crowding
images; and she watched the people passing along the street, Dan
Targatt's team hauling a load of pine-trunks down to Hepburn, the
sexton's old white horse grazing on the bank across the way, as if she
looked at these familiar sights from the other side of the grave.

She was roused from her apathy by seeing Ally Hawes come out of the
Frys' gate and walk slowly toward the red house with her uneven limping
step. At the sight Charity recovered her severed contact with reality.
She divined that Ally was coming to hear about her day: no one else
was in the secret of the trip to Nettleton, and it had flattered Ally
profoundly to be allowed to know of it.

At the thought of having to see her, of having to meet her eyes and
answer or evade her questions, the whole horror of the previous night's
adventure rushed back upon Charity. What had been a feverish nightmare
became a cold and unescapable fact. Poor Ally, at that moment,
represented North Dormer, with all its mean curiosities, its furtive
malice, its sham unconsciousness of evil. Charity knew that, although
all relations with Julia were supposed to be severed, the tender-hearted
Ally still secretly communicated with her; and no doubt Julia would
exult in the chance of retailing the scandal of the wharf. The story,
exaggerated and distorted, was probably already on its way to North
Dormer.

Ally's dragging pace had not carried her far from the Frys' gate when
she was stopped by old Mrs. Sollas, who was a great talker, and spoke
very slowly because she had never been able to get used to her new teeth
from Hepb