side-board. The noon enervation of the sultry, scorching day seems to have penetrated indoors, causing even inanimate objects to wear an aspect of despondent exhaustion.
A place is set at the end of the table, left, for someone’s dinner. Through the open door to the kitchen comes the clatter of dishes being washed, interrupted at intervals by a woman’s irritated voice and the peevish whining of a child.
At the rise of the curtain Mrs. Mayo and Mrs. Atkins are discovered sitting facing each other, Mrs. Mayo to the rear, Mrs. Atkins to the right of the table. Mrs. Mayo’s face has lost all character, disintegrated, become a weak mask wearing a helpless, doleful expression of being constantly on the verge of comfortless tears. She speaks in an uncertain voice, without assertiveness, as if all power of willing had deserted her. Mrs. Atkins is in her wheel chair. She is a thin, pale-faced, unintelligent looking woman of about forty-eight, with hard, bright eyes. A victim of partial paralysis for many years, condemned to be pushed from day to day of her life in a wheel chair, she has developed the selfish, irritable nature of the chronic invalid. Both women are dressed in black. Mrs. Atkins knits nervously as she talks. A ball of unused yarn, with needles stuck through it, lies on the table before Mrs. Mayo.
