uch degradation. As little could I
fill the place of their mutual friend as that of their deadly foe; as
little could I stand between them as trample over them. Robert is a
first-rate man--in my eyes. I _have_ loved, _do_ love, and _must___ love
him. I would be his wife if I could; as I cannot, I must go where I
shall never see him. There is but one alternative--to cleave to him as
if I were a part of him, or to be sundered from him wide as the two
poles of a sphere.--Sunder me then, Providence. Part us speedily."

Some such aspirations as these were again working in her mind late in
the afternoon, when the apparition of one of the personages haunting her
thoughts passed the parlour window. Miss Keeldar sauntered slowly by,
her gait, her countenance, wearing that mixture of wistfulness and
carelessness which, when quiescent, was the wonted cast of her look and
character of her bearing. When animated, the carelessness quite
vanished, the wistfulness became blent with a genial gaiety, seasoning
the laugh, the smile, the glance, with a unique flavour of sentiment, so
that mirth from her never resembled "the crackling of thorns under a
pot."

"What do you mean by not coming to see me this afternoon, as you
promised?" was her address to Caroline as she entered the room.

"I was not in the humour," replied Miss Helstone, very truly.

Shirley had already fixed on her a penetrating eye.

"No," she said; "I see you are not in the humour for loving me. You are
in one of your sunless, inclement moods, when one feels a
fellow-creature's presence is not welcome to you. You have such moods.
Are you aware of it?"

"Do you mean to stay long, Shirley?"

"Yes. I am come to have my tea, and must have it before I go. I shall
take the liberty, then, of removing my bonnet, without being asked."

And this she did, and then stood on the rug with her hands behind her.

"A pretty expression you have in your countenance," she went on, still
gazing keenly, though not inimically--rather indeed pityingly--at
Caroline. "Wonderfully self-supported you look, you solitude-seeking,
wounded deer. Are you afraid Shirley will worry you if she discovers
that you are hurt, and that you bleed?"

"I never do fear Shirley."

"But sometimes you dislike her; often you avoid her. Shirley can feel
when she is slighted and shunned. If you had not walked home in the
company you did last night, you would have been a different girl to-day.
What time did you