overbalanced; great distended rings of silk trembled and swayed
gigantically on the floor, and Sophia's small feet lay like the
feet of a doll on the rim of the largest circle, which curved and
arched above them like a cavern's mouth. The abrupt transition of
her features from assured pride to ludicrous astonishment and
alarm was comical enough to have sent into wild uncharitable
laughter any creature less humane than Constance. But Constance
sprang to her, a single embodied instinct of benevolence, with her
snub nose, and tried to raise her.

"Oh, Sophia!" she cried compassionately--that voice seemed not to
know the tones of reproof--"I do hope you've not messed it,
because mother would be so--"

The words were interrupted by the sound of groans beyond the door
leading to the bedrooms. The groans, indicating direst physical
torment, grew louder. The two girls stared, wonder-struck and
afraid, at the door, Sophia with her dark head raised, and
Constance with her arms round Sophia's waist. The door opened,
letting in a much-magnified sound of groans, and there entered a
youngish, undersized man, who was frantically clutching his head
in his hands and contorting all the muscles of his face. On
perceiving the sculptural group of two prone, interlocked girls,
one enveloped in a crinoline, and the other with a wool-work bunch
of flowers pinned to her knee, he jumped back, ceased groaning,
arranged his face, and seriously tried to pretend that it was not
he who had been vocal in anguish, that, indeed, he was just
passing as a casual, ordinary wayfarer through the showroom to the
shop below. He blushed darkly; and the girls also blushed.