the situation. There was
nothing but dull dreary reality.

"I daresay I shall be able to do all you require, without feeling it
any extra trouble, unless you are very helpless," said Mrs. Doddery,
who was on her knees unstrapping one of the portmanteaux.

"I am not helpless," replied Vixen, "though I daresay I have been
waited on much more than was good for me."

And then she knelt down before the other portmanteau, and undid the
buckles of the thick leather straps, in which operation she broke more
than one of her nails, and wounded her rosy finger-tips.

"Oh dear, what a useless creature I am," she thought; "and why do
people strap portmanteaux so tightly? Never mind, after a month's
residence at Les Tourelles I shall be a Spartan."

"Would you like me to unpack your trunks for you?" inquired Mrs.
Doddery, with an accent which sounded slightly ironical.

"Oh no, thanks, I can get on very well now," answered Vixen quickly;
whereupon the housekeeper opened the drawers and cupboards in the big
wainscot wardrobe, and left Miss Tempest to her own devices.

The shelves and drawers were neatly lined with white paper, and strewed
with dried lavender. This was luxury which Vixen had not expected. She
laid her pretty dresses on the shelves, smiling scornfully as she
looked at them. Of what use could pretty dresses be in a desert island?
And here were her riding-habit and her collection of whips--useless
lumber where there was no hope of a horse. She was obliged to put her
books in the wardrobe, as there was no other place for them. Her desk
and workbox she was fain to place on the floor, for the small
dressing-table would accommodate no more than her dressing-case,
devotional books, brushes and combs, pomatum-pots, and pinboxes.

"Oh dear," she sighed. "I have a great deal too much property for a
desert island. I wonder whether in some odd corner of Les Tourelles I
could find such a thing as a spare table?"

When she had finished her unpacking she went down to the hall. Not
seeing anyone about, and desiring rather to avoid Captain Winstanley
and his aunt than to rejoin them, she wandered out of the hall into one
of the many passages of the old manor house, and began a voyage of
discovery on her own account.

"If they ask me what I have been doing I can say I lost myself," she
thought.

She found the most curious rooms--or rather rooms that had once been
stately and handsome, now applied to the most curious purposes