"I see things movin'," Mrs. Flushing explained. "So"--she swept her hand
through a yard of the air. She then took up one of the cardboards which
Rachel had laid aside, seated herself on a stool, and began to flourish
a stump of charcoal. While she occupied herself in strokes which seemed
to serve her as speech serves others, Rachel, who was very restless,
looked about her.

"Open the wardrobe," said Mrs. Flushing after a pause, speaking
indistinctly because of a paint-brush in her mouth, "and look at the
things."

As Rachel hesitated, Mrs. Flushing came forward, still with a
paint-brush in her mouth, flung open the wings of her wardrobe, and
tossed a quantity of shawls, stuffs, cloaks, embroideries, on to the
bed. Rachel began to finger them. Mrs. Flushing came up once more, and
dropped a quantity of beads, brooches, earrings, bracelets, tassels, and
combs among the draperies. Then she went back to her stool and began to
paint in silence. The stuffs were coloured and dark and pale; they made
a curious swarm of lines and colours upon the counterpane, with
the reddish lumps of stone and peacocks' feathers and clear pale
tortoise-shell combs lying among them.

"The women wore them hundreds of years ago, they wear 'em still," Mrs.
Flushing remarked. "My husband rides about and finds 'em; they don't
know what they're worth, so we get 'em cheap. And we shall sell 'em to
smart women in London," she chuckled, as though the thought of these
ladies and their absurd appearance amused her. After painting for
some minutes, she suddenly laid down her brush and fixed her eyes upon
Rachel.