s bending over her,
veiled, but still distinct, the face of the young woman she had seen
yesterday.

Elizabeth-Jane looked confounded for a moment, knowing she had been
overheard, though there was pleasure in her confusion. "Yes, I heard
you," said the lady, in a vivacious voice, answering her look. "What can
have happened?"

"I don't--I can't tell you," said Elizabeth, putting her hand to her
face to hide a quick flush that had come.

There was no movement or word for a few seconds; then the girl felt that
the young lady was sitting down beside her.

"I guess how it is with you," said the latter. "That was your mother."
She waved her hand towards the tombstone. Elizabeth looked up at her as
if inquiring of herself whether there should be confidence. The lady's
manner was so desirous, so anxious, that the girl decided there should
be confidence. "It was my mother," she said, "my only friend."

"But your father, Mr. Henchard. He is living?"

"Yes, he is living," said Elizabeth-Jane.

"Is he not kind to you?"

"I've no wish to complain of him."

"There has been a disagreement?"

"A little."

"Perhaps you were to blame," suggested the stranger.

"I was--in many ways," sighed the meek Elizabeth. "I swept up the coals
when the servants ought to have done it; and I said I was leery;--and he
was angry with me."

The lady seemed to warm towards her for that reply. "Do you know the
impression your words give me?" she said ingenuously. "That he is a
hot-tempered man--a little proud--perhaps ambitious; but not a bad man."
Her anxiety not to condemn Henchard while siding with Elizabeth was
curious.

"O no; certainly not BAD," agreed the honest girl. "And he has not even
been unkind to me till lately--since mother died. But it has been very
much to bear while it has lasted. All is owing to my defects, I daresay;
and my defects are owing to my history."

"What is your history?"

Elizabeth-Jane looked wistfully at her questioner. She found that her
questioner was looking at her, turned her eyes down; and then seemed
compelled to look back again. "My history is not gay or attractive," she
said. "And yet I can tell it, if you really want to know."

The lady assured her that she did want to know; whereupon Elizabeth-Jane
told the tale of her life as she understood it, which was in general the
true one, except that the sale at the fair had no part therein.

Contrary to the girl's expectation her new friend was not