I
Life moved on another fortnight, with little to vary the monotony
of motor rides, luncheons, and irritating disputes, and all at once
Sylvia’s reason for prolonging her visit in Springdale was removed.
Lavinia Trench came home! She startled the girls by driving up to the
gate in Hafferty’s lumbering old cab, her trunk toppling precariously
on the driver’s seat and her trim body hemmed in between boxes and
travelling bags. A letter that had arrived that very morning announced
that she would yield to Ellen’s pleading that she remain another
week--unless she were greatly needed at home.
Without waiting for the ceremony of the bath and a change of raiment,
she hurried to Vine Cottage to present the souvenir she had brought
from Rochester. Judith forgot to thank her, so amazed was she by the
astounding change in the woman’s countenance. Such a change she had
witnessed in her garden when Dutton, with hoe and fine-toothed rake,
had obliterated the ridges and hummocks of his spading. All that had
been Lavinia was gone. It was not that she looked girlish, rejuvenated.
In the past few months she had made many swift changes from youth to
age--had rebounded from dank depression to hysterical buoyancy. This
change was different. It was, in fact, as if Lavinia had lent her body
to some other woman.
“I can’t stay a minute,” she fluttered. “My precious old sweetheart is
coming home early, and he thinks no one can cook chicken the way I can.
You ought to have heard him when I called him on the ’phone, a minute
ago. I thought he’d let the receiver fall, he was so astonished ... and
pleased.”