y love, Dayman, and say that I am very well."

"Are the boxes all in?" asked Mr. Brooke. "We need not detain you, Mrs.
Dayman."

Dayman turned and dropped him a mocking curtsey. "I have my orders from
my mistress, sir. Having seen the young lady safe into your hands, I
will go back to my lady at the railway station, where she now is, and
tell her how she was received."

Miss Brooke, glancing anxiously at her brother, saw him bite his lip and
frown. He did not speak, but he pointed to the door in a manner which
Dayman did not see fit to disobey.

"Good-bye, Miss Lesley--and I'll look forward to the day when I see you
back again," said the maid, in a tone of profound commiseration.

"Good-bye, Dayman, give my love to mamma," said Lesley. She would dearly
have liked to add, "Don't tell her that I cried;" but with that circle
of unsympathetic faces round her, she did not dare. She pressed her lips
together, dashed the tears from her eyes, and managed to smile, however,
as Dayman took her departure.

Meanwhile, Miss Brooke had quietly sent the maid for a glass of wine,
which she administered to the girl without further ado. Lesley drank it
obediently, and felt reinvigorated: but although her courage rose, her
spirit remained sadly low as she looked at her father's face, and saw
that it wore an uncompromising frown.

"You had better have these boxes carried upstairs as soon as possible,"
he remarked to his sister. "I will say good-night now: I have to go
out."

He turned away rather brusquely, and went back into his study, which was
situated behind the dining-room, on the ground-floor. Lesley looked
after him helplessly, with a mingled feeling of offence and relief. She
did not see him again, but was conveyed to her room by Miss Brooke, who
spoke to her kindly indeed, but with a matter-of-fact directness which
seemed hard and cold to the convent-bred girl, whose teachers and
guardians had vied with one another in sugared sweetness and a tutored
amiability of demeanor.

Lesley was taken up two flights of stairs to a room which seemed close
and stuffy to her, although in English eyes it might be deemed
comfortable and even luxurious. But padded arm-chairs and couch,
eider-down silken-covered quilts, cushions, curtains, and carpets, were
things of which she had as yet no great appreciation. The room seemed to
her altogether too full of furniture, and she longed to run to the
window for a breath of fresh air. Miss Broo