ok to the future and strengthen
themselves with hope. Times there were when she drew away into
solitude, and these were the intervals of doubt and self-questioning.
With her grandfather she was reconciled; she had become convinced of
his kindness to her, and the far-off past was now seldom in her mind.
The trouble originated in the deepest workings of her nature. When she
found herself comparing her position now with that of former days, it
excited in her a restive mood to think that chance alone had thus
raised her out of misery, that the conscious strength and purity of her
soul would never have availed to help her to the things which were now
within her grasp. The old sense of the world's injustice excited anger
and revolt in her heart. Chance, chance alone befriended her, and the
reflection injured her pride. What of those numberless struggling
creatures to whom such happy fortune could never come, who, be their
aspirations and capabilities what they might, must struggle vainly,
agonise, and in the end despair? She had been lifted out of hell, not
risen therefrom by her own strength. Sometimes it half seemed to her
that it would have been the nobler lot to remain as she was, to share
the misery of that dread realm of darkness with those poor disinherited
ones, to cherish that spirit of noble rebellion, the consciousness of
which had been as a pure fire on the altar of her being. What was to be
her future? Would she insensibly forget her past self, let her strength
subside in refinement--it might be, even lose the passion which had
made her what she was?

But hope predominated. Forget! Could she ever forget those faces in the
slums on the day when she bade farewell to poverty and all its
attendant wretchedness? Litany Lane and Elm Court were names which
already symbolised a purpose. If ever she still looked at her
grandfather with a remnant of distrust, it was because she thought of
him as drawing money from such a source, enjoying his life of ease in
disregard of the responsibilities laid upon him. The day would come
when she could find courage to speak to him. She waited and prepared
herself.

Prepared herself, for that, and for so much else. Waymark's behaviour
would have cost her the bitterest misery, had she not been able to
explain it to her own satisfaction. There could be but one reason why
he held aloof from her, and that an all-sufficient one. In her new
position, it was impossible for him to be more than