If Mrs Sucksby didn''t come first.
But then, I still supposed, too, that I should make my case with Dr Christie. I meant to show him how sane I was. At the end of our hour in the garden a bell was rung, and we were taken back to the house and made to sit, until tea-time, in a great grey room that smelt of leaking gas, that they called the drawing-room; and then we were locked back in our bedrooms. I went—still twitching, still sweating—and said nothing. I did all that the other ladies—sad Mrs Price, and pale Miss Wilson, and Betty—did: I washed my face
and hands, at the wash-stand, when they were finished with the water; and cleaned my teeth, when they had all used the brush; and put my hateful tartan gown in a tidy heap, and pulled on a night-gown; and said Amen, when Nurse Bacon mumbled out a prayer. But then, when Nurse Spiller came to the door with a can of tea and gave me a basin of it, I took it, but did not drink it. I tipped it on the floor, when I thought no-one was looking. It steamed for a second, then seeped between the boards. I put my foot on the place I had tipped it. I looked up, and saw Betty watching.