the reviving influences of my better and nobler sense. Was the
man whom I had enshrined in my heart of hearts capable of such base
wickedness as the bare idea of his marriage to another woman implied?
No! Mine was the baseness, mine the wickedness, in having even for a
moment thought it of him!

I picked up the detestable photograph from the floor, and put it back
in the book. I hastily closed the cupboard door, fetched the library
ladder, and set it against the book-case. My one idea now was the idea
of taking refuge in employment of any sort from my own thoughts. I felt
the hateful suspicion that had degraded me coming back again in spite of
my efforts to repel it. The books! the books! my only hope was to absorb
myself, body and soul, in the books.

I had one foot on the ladder, when I heard the door of the room
open--the door which communicated with the hall.

I looked around, expecting to see the Major. I saw instead the Major's
future prima donna standing just inside the door, with her round eyes
steadily fixed on me.

"I can stand a good deal," the girl began, coolly, "but I can't stand
_this_ any longer?"

"What is it that you can't stand any longer?" I asked.

"If you have been here a minute, you have been here two good hours,"
she went on. "All by yourself in the Major's study. I am of a jealous
disposition--I am. And I want to know what it means." She advanced a few
steps nearer to me, with a heightening color and a threatening look. "Is
he going to bring _you_ out on the stage?" she asked, sharply.

"Certainly not."

"He ain't in love with you, is he?"

Under other circumstances I might have told her to leave the room. In my
position at that critical moment the mere presence of a human creature
was a positive relief to me. Even this girl, with her coarse questions
and her uncultivated manners, was a welcome intruder on my solitude: she
offered me a refuge from myself.

"Your question is not very civilly put," I said. "However, I excuse you.
You are probably not aware that I am a married woman."

"What has that got to do with it?" she retorted. "Married or single,
it's all one to the Major. That brazen-faced hussy who calls herself
Lady Clarinda is married, and she sends him nosegays three times a
week! Not that I care, mind you, about the old fool. But I've lost my
situation at the railway, and I've got my own interests to look after,
and I don't know what may happen if I let other women come b