few minutes talking to Miss Quincey and thinking as she talked. Perhaps
she was wondering how she would like to be forty-five and incompetent; to
be overtaken on the terrible middle-way; to feel the hurrying generations
after her, their breath on her shoulders, their feet on her heels; to
have no hope; to see Mrs. Moon sitting before her, immovable and
symbolic, the image of what she must become. They were two very absurd
and diminutive figures, but they stood for a good deal.

To Cautley, Rhoda herself as she revolved these things looked significant
enough. Leaning forward, one elbow bent on her knee, her chin propped on
her hand, her lips pouting, her forehead knit, she might have been a
young and passionate Pallas, brooding tempestuously on the world.

"Miss Vivian is on my side, I see. I'll leave her to do the fighting."

And he left her.

Rhoda's first movement was to capture Miss Quincey's hand as it wildly
reconnoitred for a pocket handkerchief among the pillows.

"Don't worry about it," she said, "I'll speak to Miss Cursiter."

Dr. Cautley, enduring a perfunctory five minutes with Mrs. Moon, could
hear Miss Vivian running downstairs and the front door opening and
closing upon her. With a little haste and discretion he managed to
overtake her before she had gone very far. He stopped to give his verdict
on her friend.

She had expected him.