up the cart road, walking on its grassy edge, concealed from
the house by ragged lilac trees. She preferred this to-day to the open
path leading to the central door. This road brought her to the end of
the long front verandah. Here she perceived voices from the
sitting-room, and, listening, thought she heard Principal Trenholme
talking. She went on past the gable of the house into the yard, a
sloping straggling bit of ground, enclosed on three sides by the house
and its additions of dairies and stables, and on the fourth side bounded
by the river. For once the place seemed deserted by the children. A
birch, the only tree in the enclosure, cast fluttering shadow on the
closely cropped sod. Sunlight sparkled on the river and on the row of
tin milk pans set out near the kitchen door. To this door Eliza went
slowly, fanning herself with her handkerchief, for the walk had been
warm. She saw Miss Rexford was in the kitchen alone, attending to some
light cookery.

"I heard company in the front room, so I came round here till they were
gone."

"You are not usually shy," said Sophia.

Eliza sat down on a chair by the wall. With the door wide open the yard
seemed a part of the kitchen. It was a pleasant place. The birch tree
flicked its shadow as far as the much-worn wooden doorstep.

"I was very sorry to hear about last night, Miss Sophia," said Eliza,
sincerely, meaning that she was sorry on Winifred's account more
immediately.

"Yes," said Sophia, acknowledging that there was reason for such
sympathy.

"Is that Principal Trenholme talking?" asked Eliza. The talk in the
sitting-room came through the loose door, and a doubt suddenly occurred
to her.

"No; it's his brother," said Sophia.

"The voices are alike."

"Yes; but the two men don't seem to be much alike."

"I didn't know he had a brother."

"Didn't you? He has just come."

Sophia was taking tea-cakes from the oven. Eliza leaned her head against
the wall; she felt warm and oppressed. One of the smaller children
opened the sitting-room door just then and came into the kitchen. The
child wore a very clean pinafore in token of the day. She came and sat
on Eliza's knee. The door was left ajar; instead of stray words and
unintelligible sentences, all the talk of the sitting-room was now the
common property of those in the kitchen.

In beginning to hear a conversation already in full flow, it is a few
moments before the interchange of remarks and interrogatio