shortly her
sister's idol and her sister's mother-in-law's mortal foe.

And then it was that the worthy clergyman came to discover that to put
three grown-up women into the same house, and to expect them to live
together in peace and amity, is about as foolhardy an experiment as to
shut up a bulldog, a parrot, and a tom-cat in a cupboard, and expect
them to behave like so many lambs.

It is now rather more than a year since Vera Nevill came to live in her
brother-in-law's house. Let me waste no further time, but introduce her
to you at once.

The time of the year is October--the time of day is five o'clock. In the
vicarage drawing-room the afternoon tea-table has just been set out, and
the fire just lit, for it is chilly; but one of the long French windows
leading into the garden is still open, and through it Vera steps into
the room.

There is a background of brown and yellow foliage behind her, across the
garden, all aglow with the crimson light of the western sky, against
which the outlines of her figure, in its close-fitting dark dress, stand
out clearly and distinctly. Vera has the figure, not of a sylph, but of
a goddess; it is the absolute perfection of the female form. She is
tall--very tall, and she carries her head a little proudly, like a young
queen conscious of her own power.

She comes in with a certain slow and languid grace in her movements, and
pauses for an instant by the hearth, holding out her hand, that is white
and well-shaped, though perhaps a trifle too long-fingered, to the
warmth.

The glow of the newly-lit fire flickers up over her face--her face, with
its pure oval outlines, its delicate, regular features, and its dreamy
eyes, that are neither blue nor gray nor hazel, but something vague and
indistinctly beautiful, entirely peculiar to themselves. Her hair, a soft
dusky cloud, comes down low over her broad forehead, and is gathered up
at the back in some strange and thoroughly un-English fashion that would
not suit every one, yet that somehow makes a fitting crown to the stately
young head it adorns.

"Tea, Vera?" says Marion, from behind the cups and saucers.

Old Mrs. Daintree sits darning socks, severely, by the fading light.
There is a sound of distant whimpering from the shadowy corner behind the
piano; it is Tommy in disgrace. Vera turns round; Marion's kind face
looks troubled and distressed; the old lady compresses her lips firmly
and savagely.

Vera takes the cup from he