doing so if she chose. Susie
became more and more excited, more and more Dobbs, goaded by the
recollection of what she had gone through with Hilton, and Anna, as
usual under such circumstances, grew very silent. Letty sat listening in
an agony of fright lest this cup of new experiences were about to be
dashed prematurely from her eager lips; and Miss Leech discreetly left
the room, though not in the least knowing where to go, finally seeking
to drive away the nervous fears that assailed her in her lonely,
creaking bedroom, where rats were gnawing at the woodwork, by thinking
hard of Mr. Jessup, who on this occasion proved to be but a broken reed,
pitted against the stern reality of rats.

The end of it, after Susie had poured out the customary reproaches of
gross ingratitude and forgetfulness of all she had done for Anna for
fifteen long years, was that Miss Leech and Letty were to stay on as
originally intended, and come home with Anna towards the end of the
holidays, and Susie would leave with Hilton the very next day.

Anna's attempt to make it up when she said good-night was repulsed with
energy. Anna was for ever doing aggravating things, and then wanting to
make it up; but makings up without having given in an inch seemed to
Susie singularly unsatisfactory ceremonies. Oh, these Estcourts and
their obstinacy! She marched off to bed in high indignation, an
indignation not by any means allowed to cool by Hilton during the
process of undressing; and Anna, worn out, fell asleep the moment she
lay down, and woke up, as she had pictured herself doing in that odd
wooden bed, with the morning sun shining full on her face.

It was a bright and lovely day, and on the side of the house where she
slept she could not hear the wind, which was still blowing from the
north-west. She opened one of her three big windows and let the cold air
rush into her room, where the curious perfume of the baked evergreen
wreaths festooned round the walls and looking-glass and dressing-table,
joined to the heat from the stove, produced a heavy atmosphere that made
her gasp. Somebody must already have been in her room, for the stove had
been lit again, and she could see the peat blazing inside its open door.
But outside, what a divine coldness and purity! She leaned out, drinking
it in in long breaths, the warm March sun shining on her head. The
garden, a mere uncared-for piece of rough grass with big trees, was
radiant with rain-drops; the stri