erfeit of her soul for outward presentation.
She was sensitive in the extreme, always tortured, always
affecting a callous indifference to screen herself.

She was at this time a nuisance on the face of the earth,
with her spasmodic passion and her slumberous torment. She
seemed to go with all her soul in her hands, yearning, to the
other person. Yet all the while, deep at the bottom of her was a
childish antagonism of distrust. She thought she loved everybody
and believed in everybody. But because she could not love
herself nor believe in herself, she mistrusted everybody with
the mistrust of a serpent or a captured bird. Her starts of
revulsion and hatred were more inevitable than her impulses of
love.

So she wrestled through her dark days of confusion, soulless,
uncreated, unformed.

One evening, as she was studying in the parlour, her head
buried in her hands, she heard new voices in the kitchen
speaking. At once, from its apathy, her excitable spirit started
and strained to listen. It seemed to crouch, to lurk under
cover, tense, glaring forth unwilling to be seen.

There were two strange men's voices, one soft and candid,
veiled with soft candour, the other veiled with easy mobility,
running quickly. Ursula sat quite tense, shocked out of her
studies, lost. She listened all the time to the sound of the
voices, scarcely heeding the words.

The first speaker was her Uncle Tom. She knew the naive
candour covering the girding and savage misery of his soul. Who
was the other speaker? Whose voice ran on so easy, yet with an
inflamed pulse? It seemed to hasten and urge her forward, that
other voice.

"I remember you," the young man's voice was saying. "I
remember you from the first time I saw you, because of your dark
eyes and fair face."

Mrs. Brangwen laughed, shy and pleased.

"You were a curly-headed little lad," she said.

"Was I? Yes, I know. They were very proud of my curls."

And a laugh ran to silence.

"You were a very well-mannered lad, I remember," said her
father.

"Oh! did I ask you to stay the night? I always used to ask
people to stay the night. I believe it was rather trying for my
mother."

There was a general laugh. Ursula rose. She had to go.

At the click of the latch everybody looked round. The girl
hung in the doorway, seized with a moment's fierce confusion.
She was going to be good-looking. Now she had an attractive
gawkiness, as she hung a moment, not knowing how to carry