feeling
with which at length I turned my eyes away, yielded to the sensation of
gratitude and rest which the sight of the white-curtained bed--and how
much more the lying softly down upon it, nestling in the snow-white
sheets!--inspired. I remember how I thought of all the solitary places
under the night sky where I had slept, and how I prayed that I never
might be houseless any more, and never might forget the houseless. I
remember how I seemed to float, then, down the melancholy glory of that
track upon the sea, away into the world of dreams.

CHAPTER 14. MY AUNT MAKES UP HER MIND ABOUT ME

On going down in the morning, I found my aunt musing so profoundly over
the breakfast table, with her elbow on the tray, that the contents of
the urn had overflowed the teapot and were laying the whole table-cloth
under water, when my entrance put her meditations to flight. I felt sure
that I had been the subject of her reflections, and was more than ever
anxious to know her intentions towards me. Yet I dared not express my
anxiety, lest it should give her offence.

My eyes, however, not being so much under control as my tongue, were
attracted towards my aunt very often during breakfast. I never could
look at her for a few moments together but I found her looking at me--in
an odd thoughtful manner, as if I were an immense way off, instead of
being on the other side of the small round table. When she had finished
her breakfast, my aunt very deliberately leaned back in her chair,
knitted her brows, folded her arms, and contemplated me at her leisure,
with such a fixedness of attention that I was quite overpowered by
embarrassment. Not having as yet finished my own breakfast, I attempted
to hide my confusion by proceeding with it; but my knife tumbled over my
fork, my fork tripped up my knife, I chipped bits of bacon a surprising
height into the air instead of cutting them for my own eating, and
choked myself with my tea, which persisted in going the wrong way
instead of the right one, until I gave in altogether, and sat blushing
under my aunt's close scrutiny.

'Hallo!' said my aunt, after a long time.

I looked up, and met her sharp bright glance respectfully.

'I have written to him,' said my aunt.

'To--?'

'To your father-in-law,' said my aunt. 'I have sent him a letter that
I'll trouble him to attend to, or he and I will fall out, I can tell
him!'

'Does he know where I am, aunt?' I inquired, alarmed.

'I have