that's the basket armchair out of the dining-room, with a new cover
that Mene Tekel fixed for it ... the clock's out of the spare room--it
don't go, but it looks fine on the mantelpiece.... Say, duckie, are you
pleased?--are you pleased with your old Jo?"

"Oh, Joanna ... thank you," said Ellen.

"Well, I'll have to be leaving you now--that gal's got a rabbit pie in
the oven for our tea, and I must go and have a look at her crust. You
unpack and clean yourself--and be careful not to spoil anything."

Sec.5

Supper that night was rather a quiet meal. Something about Ellen drove
Joanna back into her old sense of estrangement. Her sister made her
think of a lily on a thundery day. She wore a clinging dress of dull
green stuff, which sheathed her delicate figure like a lily bract--her
throat rose out of it like a lily stalk, and her face, with its small
features and soft skin, was the face of a white flower. About her clung
a dim atmosphere of the languid and exotic, like the lily's scent which
is so unlike the lily.

"Ellen," broke out Joanna, with a glance down at her own high, tight
bosom, "don't you ever wear stays?"

"No. Miss Collins and the gym mistress both say it's unhealthy."

"Unhealthy! And don't they never wear none themselves?"

"Never. They look much better without--besides, small waists are going
out of fashion."

"But ... Ellen ... it ain't seemly--to show the natural shape of your
body as you're doing."

"I've been told my figure's a very good one."

"And whoever dared make such a remark to you?"

"It was a compliment."

"I don't call it any compliment to say such things to a young girl.
Besides, what right have you to go showing what you was meant to hide?"

"I'm not showing anything I was meant to hide. My figure isn't nearly so
pronounced as yours--if I had your figure, I couldn't wear this sort of
frock."

"My figure is as God made it"--which it certainly was not--"and I was
brought up to be the shape of a woman, in proper stays, and not the
shape of a heathen statue. I'd be ashamed for any of the folk around
here to see you like that--and if Arthur Alce, or any other man, came
in, I'd either have to send you out or wrap the table-cover round you."

Ellen took refuge in a haughty silence, and Joanna began to feel uneasy
and depressed. She thought that Ellen was "fast." Was this what she had
learned at school--to flout the standards of her home?

Sec.6

The next morni