rls from whom to
choose friends."

"It is settled, then? Really _settled_. You have seen the mistress?"

"Yes, dear, it is settled. You are to begin work at the beginning of
the term. The Websters are delighted to think of having you as a
companion."

Dreda flung out her arms with a gesture of passionate despair, stood for
a moment confronting her mother with flashing eyes and quivering lips,
then suddenly wheeled round, and rushed headlong from the room.

Her first overwhelming impulse was to get out into the air. The house
suffocated her, and besides, she was going to do something ... something
desperate ... and there was no scope indoors. She thought of the lake,
lying dull and grey within its reedy bank, and saw a vision of herself
floating on the surface, with her unbound hair streaming round her face.
In the Academy a year before she had been much attracted by a picture
of the dead Elaine, and her own hair was exactly the same shade... But
it was wicked to commit suicide, and, miserable though she was, life
held too many attractions to be lightly abandoned. She would just run
away into the darkness and the silence, with her sore, sore heart--to
commune with nature, and face the future alone with her own soul! Dreda
sobbed aloud at the pathos of the thought, and, racing down the passage,
threw open the side door leading into the garden.

A gust of wind blew into her face, a dash of cold sleety rain. The sky
was inky black, so black that it was impossible to distinguish even the
outline of the trees: the air was soaking with moisture. To one longing
for darkness and loneliness, the prospect should have been all that
could be desired; yet Dreda drew back shuddering, and shut the door with
a hasty hand. It was wet. She hated to get wet, yet she could not take
an umbrella. When your heart was breaking, and you were face to face
with one of the tragic moments of life, to walk abroad sheltered by an
umbrella was too calm and commonplace a proceeding to be contemplated
for a moment! Dreda decided that on the whole it would be better to do
her wrestling in her own room; but the noise of the opening and shutting
of the door had attracted attention, and as she slowly retraced her
steps the pantry door opened, and Martin the parlourmaid thrust her head
inquiringly outward.

Martin was a pleasant middle-aged woman, an old retainer in the family,
and the pantry at The Meads was quite a good-sized room, and