They talked about it all through tea-time. They were sorry for Mrs. Heron. They wondered what poor Dorsy would do if anything should happen to her. And through all their sorrow there ran a delicate, secret thrill of satisfaction. Something had happened. Something that interested Mamma. Two days later Dorsy came in with her tale; her nose was redder, her hare's eyes were frightened. "Mrs. Belk's there still," she said. "She wants to take Aunt to live with her. She wants her to send me away. She says it wouldn't have happened if I'd looked after her properly. And so it wouldn't, Mary, if I'd been there. But I'd a bad headache, and I was lying down for a minute when she fell.... She won't go. She's sitting there in Aunt's room all the time, talking and tiring her. Trying to poison Aunt's mind against me. Working on her to send me away." Dorsy's voice dropped and her face reddened. "She thinks I'm after Aunt's money. She's always been afraid of her leaving it to me. I'm only her husband's nephew's daughter. Mrs. Belk's her real niece.... "I'd go to-morrow, Mary, but Aunt wants me there. She doesn't like Mrs. Belk; I think she's afraid of her. And she can't get away from her. She just lies there with her poor leg in the splints; there's the four-pound weight from the kitchen scales tied on to keep it on the stretch. If you could see her eyes turning to me when I come.... "One thing--Mrs. Belk's afraid for her life of me. That's why she's trying to poison Aunt's mind." When they saw Mrs. Belk hurrying across the Green to Mrs. Heron's house they knew what she was going for. "Poor Dorsy!" they said. "Poor Dorsy!" They had something to talk to each other about now. II. Winter and spring passed. The thorn-trees flowered on Greffington Edge: dim white groves, magically still under the grey, glassy air. May passed and June. The sleek waves of the hay-fields shone with the brushing of the wind, ready for mowing. The elder tree by the garden wall was a froth of greenish white on green. At the turn of the schoolhouse lane the flowers began: wild geraniums and rose campion, purple and blue and magenta, in a white spray of cow's parsley: standing high against the stone walls, up and up the green lane. Down there, where the two dales spread out at the bottom, a tiny Dutch landscape. Flat pastures. Trees dotted about. A stiff row of trees at the end. No sky behind them. Trees green on green, not green on blue. The great flood of the sky dammed off by the hills. She shut her eyes and saw the flat fields of Ilford, and the low line of flying trees; a thin, watery mirage against the hill.