investigate her case at leisure, she chose the first afternoon when Miss
Cursiter was not at home to ask the little arithmetic teacher to lunch.

After Rhoda's lunch, soothed with her sympathy and hidden, not to say
extinguished, in an enormous chair, Miss Quincey was easily worked into
the right mood for confidences; indeed she was in that state of mind when
they rush out of their own accord in the utter exhaustion of the will.

"Are you sure you are perfectly well?" so Rhoda began her inquiry.

"Perfectly, perfectly--in myself," said Miss Quincey, "I think,
perhaps--that is, sometimes I'm a little afraid that taking so much
arsenic may have disagreed with me. You know it is a deadly poison. But
I've left it off lately, so I ought to be better--unless perhaps I'm
feeling the want of it."

"You are not worrying about St. Sidwell's--about your work?"

"It's not that--not that. But to tell you the truth, I _am_ worried,
Rhoda. For some reason or other, my own fault, no doubt, I have lost a
friend. It's a hard thing," said Miss Quincey, "to lose a friend."

"Oh, I am sure--Do you mean Miss Cursiter?"

"No, I do not mean Miss Cursiter."

"Do you mean--me then? Not me?"

"You, dear child? Never. To be plain--this is in confidence, Rhoda--I am
speaking of Dr. Cautley."