to drink any more coffee
so long as she lived! The sight, the smell of it would be for ever
associated with this ghastly moment. She turned big, woeful eyes on her
mother's face and stammered a breathless inquiry:

"Mother, you have something to say! Please say it. Don't break it to
me, please; it's worse to wait. Say it bang out!"

"Oh, Darsie, darling; yes, darling, it _is_ as you suppose! Aunt Maria
has chosen you. She wants you to start with her on Saturday morning,
but if it's too soon--if you would rather stay over Sunday, I will
arrange..."

Darsie bit her lips in the desperate resolve not to cry, but to carry
off the situation with a high air.

"If I'm to go at all, I'd rather go at once, and get it over. There's
nothing to be gained by delay. `Better to die by sudden shock than
perish piecemeal on the rock.'"

"But you will want to say goodbye to your friends, dear; you will have
little arrangements to make..." Mrs Garnett was all nervousness and
anxiety to appease, but after the manner of victims Darsie felt a
perverse satisfaction in rejecting overtures, even when by so doing she
doubly punished herself.

"I don't mean to say goodbye. I don't wish to see any one before I go.
I hate scenes."

"Well, well! just as you please, dear. After all, it is for a very
short time. Eight weeks will soon pass."

Silence. Every youthful face at the table was set in an eloquent
declaration that eight weeks was an eternity, a waste, a desert of
space. Mr Garnett put down his newspaper and hurriedly left the room.
He had the usual male horror of scenes, and, moreover, Darsie was his
special pet, and his own nerves were on edge at the thought of the
coming separation. If the child cried or appealed to him for
protection, he would not like to say what he might do. Flight appeared
to be his safest course, but Darsie felt a pang of disappointment and
wounded love at this desertion of her cause, and the smart did not help
to improve her temper.

"Aunt Maria wishes to see you, dear, as soon as you have finished your
breakfast," continued Mrs Garnett, elaborately conciliatory. "Father
and I are very grateful to her for her interest in you, but you know,
dear, how we feel about losing you, how we sympathise with your
disappointment! We are convinced that in the end this chance will be
for your benefit; but in the meantime it is very hard. We are sorry for
you, dear."

"And I," declared Darsie coldly,