She felt that she ought to kiss her aunt; she thought she saw in her aunt's small rather watery eyes an appeal that she should do so.

The distance, however, seemed infinite, and Maggie had a strange feeling that her bending down would break some spell, that the picture in the passage would fall with a ghostly clatter, that Edward the parrot would scream and shriek, that the gas would burst into a bubbling horror, that the big black cat would leap upon her and tear her with its claws.
"Well, I'm not afraid," she thought.

And, as though she were defying the universe, she bent down and kissed her aunt.

She fancied that this act of hers produced a little sigh of relief.

Every one seemed to settle down.