afternoon, her heart sank within her. If it was
only for her father's sake, she must not refuse him or show any
disinclination which he might construe into incivility. She missed Mimi
more than she could say or even dared to think. Hitherto, she had always
looked to her cousin for sympathy, for understanding, for loyal support.
Now she and all these things, and a thousand others--gentle, assuring,
supporting--were gone. And instead there was a horrible aching void.

For the whole afternoon and evening, and for the following forenoon, poor
Lilla's loneliness grew to be a positive agony. For the first time she
began to realise the sense of her loss, as though all the previous
suffering had been merely a preparation. Everything she looked at,
everything she remembered or thought of, became laden with poignant
memory. Then on the top of all was a new sense of dread. The reaction
from the sense of security, which had surrounded her all her life, to a
never-quieted apprehension, was at times almost more than she could bear.
It so filled her with fear that she had a haunting feeling that she would
as soon die as live. However, whatever might be her own feelings, duty
had to be done, and as she had been brought up to consider duty first,
she braced herself to go through, to the very best of her ability, what
was before her.

Still, the severe and prolonged struggle for self-control told upon
Lilla. She looked, as she felt, ill and weak. She was really in a
nerveless and prostrate condition, with black circles round her eyes,
pale even to her lips, and with an instinctive trembling which she was
quite unable to repress. It was for her a sad mischance that Mimi was
away, for her love would have seen through all obscuring causes, and have
brought to light the girl's unhappy condition of health. Lilla was
utterly unable to do anything to escape from the ordeal before her; but
her cousin, with the experience of her former struggles with Mr. Caswall
and of the condition in which these left her, would have taken steps--even
peremptory ones, if necessary--to prevent a repetition.

Edgar arrived punctually to the time appointed by herself. When Lilla,
through the great window, saw him approaching the house, her condition of
nervous upset was pitiable. She braced herself up, however, and managed
to get through the interview in its preliminary stages without any
perceptible change in her normal appearance and bearing. It