omposedly as usual. "Miss,
there, insisted on taking your tray up this morning. Has she broken
anything?"

"Go to the window. I want to speak to Rachel," said Mrs. Milroy.

As soon as her daughter's back was turned, she beckoned eagerly to the
nurse. "Anything wrong?" she asked, in a whisper. "Do you think she
suspects us?"

The nurse turned away with her hard, sneering smile. "I told you it
should be done," she said, "and it _has_ been done. She hasn't the ghost
of a suspicion. I waited in the room; and I saw her take up the letter
and open it."

Mrs. Milroy drew a deep breath of relief. "Thank you," she said, loud
enough for her daughter to hear. "I want nothing more."

The nurse withdrew; and Neelie came back from the window. Mrs. Milroy
took her by the hand, and looked at her more attentively and more kindly
than usual. Her daughter interested her that morning; for her daughter
had something to say on the subject of Miss Gwilt.

"I used to think that you promised to be pretty, child," she said,
cautiously resuming the interrupted conversation in the least direct
way. "But you don't seem to be keeping your promise. You look out of
health and out of spirits. What is the matter with you?"

If there had been any sympathy between mother and child, Neelie might
have owned the truth. She might have said frankly: "I am looking ill,
because my life is miserable to me. I am fond of Mr. Armadale, and Mr.
Armadale was once fond of me. We had one little disagreement, only one,
in which I was to blame. I wanted to tell him so at the time, and I have
wanted to tell him so ever since; and Miss Gwilt stands between us and
prevents me. She has made us like strangers; she has altered him, and
taken him away from me. He doesn't look at me as he did; he doesn't
speak to me as he did; he is never alone with me as he used to be; I
can't say the words to him that I long to say; and I can't write to him,
for it would look as if I wanted to get him back. It is all over between
me and Mr. Armadale; and it is that woman's fault. There is ill-blood
between Miss Gwilt and me the whole day long; and say what I may, and do
what I may, she always gets the better of me, and always puts me in the
wrong. Everything I saw at Thorpe Ambrose pleased me, everything I did
at Thorpe Ambrose made me happy, before she came. Nothing pleases me,
and nothing makes me happy now!" If Neelie had ever been accustomed to
ask her mother's advice and to trust h