" Curled up, she set herself to realize
the lie. And perhaps she might have succeeded thoroughly in the sad
attempt had not Jessie, in sleep missing the contact of her mistress,
wriggled lazily on her side up the bed after Cuckoo's feet, discovering
which, she again composed herself to slumber. The renunciation was
not to be complete in imagination. Jessie's love, when present, was too
frustrating. And Cuckoo, casting away her horrible thought in a sort of
hasty panic, caught her companion with a tail in her arms, and made her
rest beside her, close, close. Jessie was well content, but still sleepy.
She reposed her tiny head upon the pillow, lengthened herself between the
sheets and dreamed again. And while she dreamed, the black thought about
her came back to Cuckoo. It was assertive, and Cuckoo began to fear it.
The fear of a thought is a horrible thing; sometimes it is worse than
the fear of death. This one made Cuckoo think herself more cruel than
any woman since the world began. Yet she could not exorcise it. On the
contrary, she grew familiar with it as the day marched on, until it put
on a fatal expression of duty. All that day she revolved it. Mrs. Brigg
attacked her again. Food was lacking. Cuckoo's case became desperate.
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