"That he would give his ears to get you?" Mrs. Gereth broke in. "I had a visit from Mrs. Brigstock." Fleda paid this statement the homage of a minute's muteness. "As to that, naturally, she has reason."!

Fleda moved to the door and opened it. "I'm not prepared to say. You must have patience and see." Fleda faltered a moment. "I think she has gone too far." Then she added: "I shall immediately tell her that I've said that to you."

"Well," Fleda replied, "I couldn't stay. I didn't like it. I didn't like it at all—I couldn't bear it," she went on. "In the midst of those trophies of Poynton, living with them, touching them, using them, I felt as if I were backing her up. As I was not a bit of an accomplice, as I hate what she has done, I didn't want to be, even to the extent of the mere look of it—what is it you call such people?—an accessory after the fact." There was something she kept back so rigidly that the joy of uttering the rest was double. She felt the sharpest need of giving him all the other truth. There was a matter as to which she had deceived him, and there was a matter as to which she had deceived Mrs. Gereth, but her lack of pleasure in deception as such came home to her now. She busied herself with the tea and, to extend the occupation, cleared the table still more, spreading out the coarse cups and saucers and the vulgar little plates. She was aware that she produced more confusion than symmetry, but she was also aware that she was violently nervous. Owen tried to help her with something: this made rather for disorder. "My reason for not writing to you," she pursued, "was simply that I was hoping to hear more from Ricks. I've waited from day to day for that." Mrs. Gereth reflected. "Very likely." Then she too hesitated. "The question is if it was worse than yours." Fleda faltered a moment. "I think she has gone too far." Then she added: "I shall immediately tell her that I've said that to you."