o cook in Frau Manske's kitchen. "Such a quiet,
respectable-looking young man!" she exclaimed, horror-stricken. "And
about to take holy orders!"

"Well, you see he isn't quiet and respectable at all," said Anna. "He is
unusually enterprising, and quite without morals. Only a demoralised
person would take advantage of a poor little pupil in that way."

She lit a candle, and burnt the heart. "There," she said, when it was in
ashes, "that's the end of that. Heaven knows what Letty has been led
into saying, or what ideas he has put into her head. I can't bear to
think of it. I hadn't the courage to cross-question her much--I was
afraid I should hear something that would make me too angry, and I'd
have to tell the parson. Anyhow, dear Miss Leech, we will not leave her
alone again, ever, will we? I don't suppose a thing like this will
happen twice, but we won't let it have a chance, will we? Now don't be
too unhappy. Tell me about Mr. Jessup."

It was Miss Leech's fault, Anna knew; but she so evidently knew it
herself, and was so deeply distressed, that rebukes were out of the
question. She spent the evening and most of the night in useless
laments, while, in the room adjoining, Letty lay face downwards on her
bed, bathed in tears. For Letty's conscience was in a grievous state of
tumult. She had meant well, and she had done badly. She had not thought
her aunt would be angry--was she not in full possession of the facts
concerning Mr. Jessup's courtship? And had not Miss Leech said that no
higher honour could be paid to a woman than to fall in love with her and
make her an offer of marriage? Herr Klutz, it is true, was not the sort
of person her aunt could marry, for her aunt was stricken in years, and
he looked about the same age as her brother Peter; besides, he was
clearly, thought Letty, of the guttersnipe class, a class that bit its
nails and never married people's aunts. But, after all, her aunt could
always say No when the supreme moment arrived, and nobody ought to be
offended because they had been fallen in love with, and he was
frightfully in love, and talked the most awful rot. Nor had she
encouraged him. On the contrary, she had discouraged him; but it was
precisely this discouragement, so virtuously administered, that lay so
heavily on her conscience as she lay so heavily on her bed. She had been
proud of it till this interview with her aunt; since then it had taken
on a different complexion, and she was sure, d