other day. You are not fit for it now?"

"Hardly."

"Did you sit up with that girl last night?

"I sat up. She did not want much done for her. My being there was a
great comfort to her."

"Far too great a comfort. You are a naughty child. Do you fancy,
Eleanor, your husband will allow you to do such things?"

"I must try to do what is right, Macintosh."

"Do you not think it will be right that you should pleasure me in what
I ask of you?" he said very gently and with a caressing action which
took away the edge of the words.

"Yes--in things that are right," said Eleanor, who felt that she owed
him all gentleness because of the wrong she had done.

"I shall not ask you anything that is not right; but if I should,--the
responsibility of your doing wrong will rest on me. Now do you feel
inclined to practise obedience a little to day?"

"No, not at all," said Eleanor honestly, her blood rousing.

"It will be all the better practice. You must go and lie down and rest
carefully, and get ready to ride with me this afternoon, if the weather
will do. Eh, Eleanor?"

"I do not think I shall want to ride to-day."

"Kiss me, and say you will do as I bid you."

Eleanor obeyed, and went to her room feeling wretched. She must find
some way quickly to alter this state of things--if she could alter
them. In the mean time she had promised to rest. It was a comfort to
lock the door and feel that for hours at any rate she was alone from
all the world. But Eleanor's heart fainted. She lay down, and for a
long time remained in motionless passive dismay; then nature asserted
her rights and she slept.

If sleep did not quite "knit up the ravelled sleeve of care" for her,
Eleanor yet felt much less ragged when she came out of her slumber.
There was some physical force now to meet the mental demand. The first
thing demanded was a letter to Mr. Carlisle. It was in vain to think to
tell him in spoken words what she wanted him to know; he would cut them
short or turn them aside as soon as he perceived their drift, before
she could at all possess him with the facts of the case. Eleanor sat
down before dressing, to write her letter, so that no call might break
her off until it was done.

It was a weary, anxious, sorrowful writing; done with some tears and
some mute prayers for help; with images constantly starting into her
mind that she had to put aside together with the hot drops they called
forth. The letter was finished, when El