ses of holy blue and faint hints of
the coming spring. Even the spire of a church helped her, although it
could only point a very little way up into the far heaven. She stood
quite still, wrestling silently with that fierce temptation to rejoice
over her enemy's downfall.

All Bertha's insulting speeches and unkind actions came back into her
mind. It might be impossible to love her, but it was--it must
be--possible to be sorry for her blighted life and darkened home. Elsie
called up a vision of the dressy, well-to-do Bertha, who had always put
herself into a front place, and wondered how she could play the part of
a neglected wife, looked down upon by her neighbours and forgotten by
the world?

The thought of the crushed woman, who had so little in her interior
world to help her, was not without effect. Pity triumphed. Elsie's dark
eyes were suddenly dimmed with tears; she was grieved for Bertha and
ashamed of herself. The fight was over, and a voice within her seemed to
say that it would never have to be so fiercely fought again.

She drew a deep breath of relief as she turned away from the window,
putting the letter into her pocket. The tea-tray, with its solitary cup
and saucer, was waiting on the table, and Elsie poured out tea,
congratulating herself that she was alone. She was not an unsociable
woman; but the boarding-school, with all its noisy, merry occupants, had
set her longing for solitude. She had felt far too weary and dispirited
to enter into the fun and prattle of the girls.

While she drank her tea she glanced round the little room, surveying the
decorations which had kept her busy for a day or two. Some relics of her
old home-life were gathered here--a quaint oval looking-glass, some bits
of ancient china, some photographs, and a goodly number of books. Her
little clock ticked cheerfully on the mantelpiece, one or two
richly-coloured fans and screens brightened the walls; there was a faint
scent of sandal-wood in the air. She had not yet unlocked the handsome
desk which stood on a table in the corner, and it occurred to her that
she would answer some of her neglected letters that very evening.

Going to the desk, and opening it, she noticed for the first time the
table on which it had been placed. It stood in the darkest part of the
room, and she had not observed its old-fashioned claw feet and the
curiously-wrought brass handles of its drawer. It was not a sham drawer,
but a real one, which opened