'Oh, but I shall. You must want support at such a moment as this, and as far as I can give it you shall have it.'
'But it won't be any support to have you in the cab with me. If you will believe me, I had rather go alone. It is so necessary that I should think about all this.'
But Martha would not believe her: and as for thinking, she was quite ready to take that part of the work herself. 'Don't say another word,' she said, as she thrust herself in at the cab-door after her friend. Mrs. Furnival hardly did say another word, but Martha Biggs said many. She knew that Mrs. Furnival was cross, ill pleased, and not disposed to confidence. But what of that? Her duty as a friend was not altered by Mrs. Furnival's ill humour. She would persevere, and having in her hands so great an opportunity, did not despair but what the time might come when both Mr. and Mrs. Furnival would with united voices hail her as their preserver. Poor Martha Biggs! She did not mean amiss, but she was troublesome.
It was very necessary that Mrs. Furnival should think over the step which she was taking. What was it that she intended to do when she arrived at Hamworth? That plan of forcing her way into Lady Mason's house did not recommend itself to her the more in that it was recommended by Martha Biggs. 'I suppose you will come up to us this evening?' Martha said, when she left her friend in the railway carriage. 'Not this evening, I think. I shall be so tired,' Mrs. Furnival had replied. 'Then I shall come down to you,' said Martha, almost holloaing after her friend, as the train started. Mr. Furnival would not have been displeased had he known the state of his wife's mind at that moment towards her late visitor. During the whole of her journey down to Hamworth she tried to think what she would say to Lady Mason, but instead of so thinking her mind would revert to the unpleasantness of Miss Biggs's friendship.
When she left the train at the Hamworth station she was solicited by the driver of a public vehicle to use his fly, and having ascertained from the man that he well knew the position of Orley Farm, she got into the carriage and had herself driven to the residence of her hated rival. She had often heard of Orley Farm, but she had never as yet seen it, and now felt considerable anxiety both as regards the house and its occupant.
'This is Orley Farm, ma'am,' said the man, stopping at the gate. 'Shall I drive up?'
But at this moment the gate was opened by a decent, respectable woman,—Mrs. Furnival would not quite have called her a lady,—who looked hard at the fly as it turned on to the private road.
'Perhaps this lady could tell me,' said Mrs. Furnival, putting out her hand. 'Is this where Lady Mason lives?'
