)

MARTHA. Well! Did you ever?

LAURA (_facing about after vain search_). Does she think that is the
proper way to behave to _me?_ Julia!

MARTHA. It's no good, Laura. You know Julia, as well as I do. If she makes
up her mind to a thing--

LAURA. Yes. She's been waiting here to exercise her patience on me, and
now she's happy! Well, she'll have to learn that this house doesn't belong
to _her_ any longer. She has got to accommodate herself to living
with others.... I wonder how she'd like me to go and sit in that pet chair
of hers?

JULIA (_softly reappearing in the chair which the 'dear Mother' usually
occupies_). You can go and sit in it if you wish, Laura.

LAURA (_ignoring her return_). Martha, do you remember that odious
man who used to live next door, who played the 'cello on Sundays?

MARTHA. Oh yes, I remember. They used to hang out washing in the garden,
didn't they?

LAURA (_very scandalously_). Julia is friends with him! They call on
each other. His wife doesn't live with him any longer.

(_Julia rises and goes slowly and majestically out of the room_.)

LAURA (_after relishing what she conceives to be her rout of the
enemy_). Martha, what do you think of Julia?

MARTHA. Oh, she's--What do you want me to think?

LAURA. High and mighty as ever, isn't she? She's been here by herself so
long she thinks the whole place is hers.

MARTHA. I daresay we shall settle down well enough presently. Which room
are you sleeping in?

LAURA. Of course, I have my old one. Where do you want to go?

MARTHA. The green room will suit me.

LAURA. And Julia means to keep our Mother's room: I can see that. No
wonder she won't come and stay,

MARTHA. Have you seen her?

LAURA. She just 'looked in,' as Julia calls it. I could see she'd hoped to
find me alone. Julia always thought _she_ was the favourite. I knew
better.

MARTHA. How was she?

LAURA. Just her old self; but as if she missed something. It wasn't a
_happy_ face, until I spoke to her: then it all brightened up.... Oh,
thank you for the wreath, Martha. Where did you get it?

MARTHA. Emily made it.

LAURA. That fool! Then she made her own too, I suppose?

MARTHA. Yes. That went the day before, so you got it in time.

LAURA. I thought it didn't look up to much. (_She is now contemplating
Emily's second effort with a critical eye_.) Now a little maiden-hair
fern would have made a world of difference.

MARTHA. I don't hold with flowers myself. I th