, but I think I never _can_ love her again,"
came as the recurrent burden of poor little Anna's inward monody. And
even Mrs. Gascoigne had an angry feeling toward her niece which she
could not refrain from expressing (apologetically) to her husband.

"I know of course it is better, and we ought to be thankful that she is
not in love with the poor boy; but really. Henry, I think she is hard;
she has the heart of a coquette. I can not help thinking that she must
have made him believe something, or the disappointment would not have
taken hold of him in that way. And some blame attaches to poor Fanny;
she is quite blind about that girl."

Mr. Gascoigne answered imperatively: "The less said on that point the
better, Nancy. I ought to have been more awake myself. As to the boy,
be thankful if nothing worse ever happens to him. Let the thing die out
as quickly as possible; and especially with regard to Gwendolen--let it
be as if it had never been."

The rector's dominant feeling was that there had been a great escape.
Gwendolen in love with Rex in return would have made a much harder
problem, the solution of which might have been taken out of his hands.
But he had to go through some further difficulty.

One fine morning Rex asked for his bath, and made his toilet as usual.
Anna, full of excitement at this change, could do nothing but listen
for his coming down, and at last hearing his step, ran to the foot of
the stairs to meet him. For the first time he gave her a faint smile,
but it looked so melancholy on his pale face that she could hardly help
crying.

"Nannie!" he said gently, taking her hand and leading her slowly along
with him to the drawing-room. His mother was there, and when she came
to kiss him, he said: "What a plague I am!"

Then he sat still and looked out of the bow-window on the lawn and
shrubs covered with hoar-frost, across which the sun was sending faint
occasional gleams:--something like that sad smile on Rex's face, Anna
thought. He felt as if he had had a resurrection into a new world, and
did not know what to do with himself there, the old interests being
left behind. Anna sat near him, pretending to work, but really watching
him with yearning looks. Beyond the garden hedge there was a road where
wagons and carts sometimes went on field-work: a railed opening was
made in the hedge, because the upland with its bordering wood and clump
of ash-trees against the sky was a pretty sight. Presently ther