The new doctor was short and stern with young Greatorex.

The two voices, the soft and the stern, spoke together for a moment,
low, inaudible. Then young Greatorex's voice was heard again, and in
its softness there was the furtive note of shame.

"I joost looked in to Vicarage to leave woord with Paason."

The noise of the wheels and hoofs began again, the iron shoes clanked
together and struck out the rhythm that the sisters knew.

And with the first beat of it, and with the sound of the two voices in
the road, life, secret and silent, stirred in their blood and nerves.
It quivered like a hunting thing held on the leash.




V


Their stillness, their immobility were now intense. And not one spoke
a word to the other.

All three of them were thinking.

Mary thought, "Wednesday is his day. On Wednesday I will go into the
village and see all my sick people. Then I shall see him. And he
will see me. He will see that I am kind and sweet and womanly." She
thought, "That is the sort of woman that a man wants." But she did not