I have a brooch that is set with brilliants. I think of it now. I think—as I have, before, though not in many days—of Sue, breathing proprietorially over the stones, gauging their worth . . .
After all, we are not ordinary girls, in an ordinary parlour; and she is interested in my fortune only as she supposes it hers. Her eye grows narrow again. Her voice lifts out of its whisper and is only pert. I move away from her while she sits gathering the deck, turning the cards in her hands and frowning. She has let one fall, and has not seen it: the two of hearts. I place my heel upon it, imagining one of the painted red hearts my own; and I grind it into the carpet.
She finds it, when I have risen, and tries to smooth the crease from it; then plays on at Patience, as doggedly as before.
I look, again, at her hands. They have grown whiter, and are healed about the nails. They are small, and in gloves will seem smaller; and then will resemble my own.
This must be done. This should have been done, before. Richard is coming, and I am overtaken by a sense of duties unmet: a panicking sense that hours, days—dark, devious fish of time—have slithered by, uncaptured. I pass a fretful night. Then, when we rise and she comes to dress me, I pluck at the frill on the sleeve of her gown.