t melancholy of eighteen.

'It is come to a pretty pass,' she said to herself, 'that I should be
able to think of nothing but schemes for getting Catherine married and
out of my way! Considering what she is and what I am, and how she
has slaved for us all her life, I seem to have descended pretty low.
Heigho!'

And with a portentous sigh she dropped her chin on her hand. She was
half acting, acting to herself. Life was not really quite unbearable,
and she knew it. But it relieved her to overdo it.

'I wonder how much chance there is,' she mused, presently. 'Mr. Elsmere
will soon be ridiculous. Why, _I_ saw him gather up those violets she
threw away yesterday on Moor Crag. And as for her, I don't believe she
has realized the situation a bit. At least, if she has she is as unlike
other mortals in this as in everything else. But when she does--'

She frowned and meditated, but got no light on the problem. Chattie
jumped up on the windowsill, with her usual stealthy _aplomb_, and
rubbed herself against the girl's face.

'Oh, Chattie!' cried Rose, throwing her arms round the cat, 'if
Catherine 'll _only_ marry Mr. Elsmere, nay dear, and be happy ever
afterward, and set me free to live my own life a bit, I'll be _so_ good,
you won't know me, Chattie. And you shall have a new collar, my beauty,
and cream till you die of it!'

And springing up she dragged in the cat, and snatching a scarlet anemone
from a bunch on the table, stood opposite Chattie, who stood slowly
waving her magnificent tail from side to side, and glaring as though it
were not at all to her taste to be hustled and bustled in this way.

'Now, Chattie, listen! Will she?'

A leaf of the flower dropped on Chattie's nose.

'Won't she? Will she? Won't she? Will--Tiresome flower, why did Nature
give it such a beggarly few petals? 'If I'd had a daisy it would have
all come right. Come, Chattie, waltz; and let's forgot this wicked
world!'

And, snatching up her violin, the girl broke into a Strauss waltz,
dancing to it the while, her cotton skirts flying, her pretty feet
twinkling, till her eyes glowed, and her cheeks blazed with a double
intoxication--the intoxication of movement, and the intoxication of
sound--the cat meanwhile following her with little mincing, perplexed
steps, as though not knowing what to make of her.

'Rose, you madcap!' cried Agnes, opening the door.

'Not at all, my dear,' said Rose calmly, stopping to take breath.
'Excellent pra