gination evoked
upon the glass the same white and threatening image--her own near
kinswoman--the child of her mother's sister! How strange! Where was the
little gossamer creature now--in what safe haven of money and family
affection, and all the spoiling that money brings? From the climbing
paths of her own difficult and personal struggle Julie Le Breton looked
down with sore contempt on such a degenerate ease of circumstance. She
had heard it said that the mother and daughter were lingering abroad for
a time on their way home from India. Yet was the girl all the while
pining for England, thinking not of her garden, her horse, her pets, but
only of this slim young soldier who in a few minutes, perhaps, would
knock at Lady Henry's door, in quest of Aileen Moffatt's unknown,
unguessed-of cousin? These thoughts sent wild combative thrills through
Julie's pulses. She turned to one of the old French clocks. How much
longer now--till he came?

"Her ladyship would like to see you, miss."

The voice was Dixon's, and Julie turned hurriedly, recalling all her
self-possession. She climbed some steep stairs, still unmodernized, to
Lady Henry's floor. That lady slept at the back of the house, so as to
be out of noise. Her room was an old-fashioned apartment, furnished
about the year Queen Victoria came to the throne, with furniture,
chintzes, and carpet of the most approved early Victorian pattern. What
had been ugly then was dingy now; and its strong mistress, who had known
so well how to assimilate and guard the fine decorations and noble
pictures of the drawing-rooms, would not have a thing in it touched. "It
suits me," she would say, impatiently, when her stout sister-in-law
pleaded placidly for white paint and bright colors. "If it's ugly, so
am I."

Fierce, certainly, and forbidding she was on this February evening. She
lay high on her pillow, tormented by her chronic bronchitis and by
rheumatic pain, her brows drawn together, her vigorous hands clasped
before her in an evident tension, as though she only restrained herself
with difficulty from defying maid, doctor, and her own sense
of prudence.

"Well, you have dressed?" she said, sharply, as Julie Le Breton entered
her room.

"I did not get your message till I had finished dinner. And I dressed
before dinner."

Lady Henry looked her up and down, like a cat ready to pounce.

"You didn't bring me those letters to sign?"

"No, I thought you were not fit for it."