ten o'clock, but the tea-things were on the
table, prepared for a meal, the lamp shone with a sort of consciousness,
and Ethel moved restlessly about, sometimes settling her tea equipage,
sometimes putting away a stray book, or resorting by turns to her book,
or to work a red and gold scroll on coarse canvas, on the other end of
which Meta was employed.

"Nervous, Ethel?" said Meta, looking up with a merry provoking smile,
knowing how much the word would displease.

"That is for you," retorted Ethel, preferring to carry the war into the
enemy's quarters. "What, don't you know that prudent people say that
your fate depends on her report?"

"At least," said Meta, laughing; "she is a living instance that every
one is not eaten up, and we shall see if she fulfils Tom's prediction
of being tattooed, or of having a slice out of the fattest part of her
cheek."

"I know very well," said Ethel, "the worst she said it would be, the
more you would go."

"Not quite that," said Meta, blushing, and looking down.

"Come, don't be deceitful!" said Ethel. "You know very well that you are
still more bent on it than you were last year."

"To be sure I am!" said Meta, looking up with a sudden beamy flash of
her dark eyes. "Norman and I know each other so much better now," she
added, rather falteringly.

"Ay! I know you are ready to go through thick and thin, and that is
why I give my consent and approbation. You are not to be stopped for
nonsense."

"Not for nonsense, certainly," said Meta, "but"--and her voice became
tremulous--"if Dr. May deliberately said it would be wrong, and that I
should be an encumbrance and perplexity, I am making up my mind to the
chance."

"But what would you do?" asked Ethel.

"I don't know. You should not ask such questions, Ethel."

"Well! it won't happen, so it is no use to talk about it," said Ethel.
"Fancy my having made you cry."

"Very silly of me," said Meta, brightening and laughing, but sighing. "I
am only afraid Mrs. Arnott may think me individually unfit for the kind
of life, as if I could not do what other women can. Do I look so?"

"You look as if you were meant to be put under a glass case!" said
Ethel, surveying the little elegant figure, whose great characteristic
was a look of exquisite finish, not only in the features and colouring,
the turn of the head, and the shape of the small rosy-tipped fingers,
but in everything she wore, from the braids of black silk hair, to the
li