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She was groggy, but not sufficiently primed to go there herself; she
knew that everybody's eye would be fixed upon her; she had been much
talked about of late. Drunk, she was impossible; dead sober, almost as
bad--haughty, sullen, logical, with a grieved and surprised air
suggestive of wounded dignity.
People avoided Miss Wilberforce. And yet you could not help liking her
in those rare moments when she was just a little disguised. She had a
pretty wit, then; a residue of gentle nurture; tender instincts and a
winsomeness of manner that captivated you. Nor were appearances against
her. That frail, arrowy figure was invariably clothed in black. She
wore the colour by instinct. They said she had lost her sailor fiance
who was drowned, poor lad, in the Mediterranean; and that now she
wandered about at night looking for him, or trying to forget him and
seeking oblivion in tipple.
The story happened to be true, for a wonder. She had received a twist
for life. The death of this young lover gave to her impressionable
being a shock which never passed off again.


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