her bright
color, her beauty, her dark flowing curls, and her agile figure? Mr.
Carlyle himself could not have told her. But she was good-looking still,
in spite of it all, gentle and interesting; and people wondered to see
that gray hair in one yet young.

She had been with the Crosbys going on for two years. After her recovery
from the railway accident, she removed to a quiet town in the vicinity;
they were living there, and she became daily governess to Helena. The
Crosbys were given to understand that she was English, but the widow of
a Frenchman--she was obliged to offer some plausible account. There were
no references; but she so won upon their esteem as the daily governess,
that they soon took her into the house. Had Lady Isabel surmised
that they would be travelling to so conspicuous a spot as an
English-frequented German watering-place, she might have hesitated
to accept the engagement. However, it had been of service to her, the
meeting with Mrs. Ducie proving that she was altered beyond chance of
recognition. She could go anywhere now.

But now, about her state of mind? I don't know how to describe it; the
vain yearning, the inward fever, the restless longing for what might
not be. Longing for what? For her children. Let the mother, be she a
duchess, or be she an apple-woman at a stand, be separated for awhile
from her little children; let _her_ answer how she yearns for them. She
may be away on a tour of pleasure for a few weeks; the longing to see
their little faces again, to hear their prattling tongues, to feel their
soft kisses, is kept under; and there may be frequent messages, "The
children's dear love to mamma;" but as the weeks lengthen out, the
desire to see them again becomes almost irrepressible. What must it have
been then, for Lady Isabel, who had endured this longing for years? Talk
of the _mal du pays_, which is said to attack the Swiss when exiled from
their country--that is as nothing compared to the heartsickness which
clung to Lady Isabel. She had passionately loved her children; she had
been anxious for their welfare in all ways; and not the least she had to
endure now was the thought that she had abandoned them to be trained by
strangers. Would they be trained to goodness, to morality, to religion?
Careless as she herself had once been upon these points, she had learnt
better now. Would Isabel grow up to indifference, to--perhaps do as she
had done? Lady Isabel flung her hands before h