ad a tendency to
produce in her system "the creeps."

"You must try to overcome it, Jane," Lady Walderhurst said. "I'm afraid
it's because of her colour. I've felt a little silly and shy about her
myself, but it isn't nice of us. You ought to read 'Uncle Tom's Cabin,'
and all about that poor religious Uncle Tom, and Legree, and Eliza
crossing the river on the blocks of ice."

"I have read it twice, your ladyship," was Jane's earnestly regretful
response, "and most awful it is, and made me and mother cry beyond
words. And I suppose it is the poor creature's colour that's against
her, and I'm trying to be kind to her, but I must own that she makes me
nervous. She asks me such a lot of questions in her queer way, and
stares at me so quiet. She actually asked me quite sudden the other day
if I loved the big Mem Sahib. I didn't know what she _could_ mean at
first, but after a while I found out it was her Indian way of meaning
your ladyship, and she didn't intend disrespect, because she spoke of
you most humble afterwards, and called his lordship the Heaven born."

"Be as kind as you can to her, Jane," instructed her mistress. "And take
her a nice walk occasionally. I daresay she feels very homesick here."

What Ameerah said to her mistress was that these English servant women
were pigs and devils, and could conceal nothing from those who chose to
find out things from them. If Jane had known that the Ayah could have
told her of every movement she made during the day or night, of her
up-gettings and down-lyings, of the hour and moment of every service
done for the big Mem Sahib, of why and how and when and where each thing
was done, she would have been frightened indeed.

One day, it is true, she came into Lady Walderhurst's sleeping apartment
to find Ameerah standing in the middle of it looking round its contents
with restless, timid, bewildered eyes. She wore, indeed, the manner of
an alarmed creature who did not know how she had got there.

"What are you doing here?" demanded Jane. "You have no right in this
part of the house. You're taking a great liberty, and your mistress will
be angry."

"My Mem Sahib asked for a book," the Ayah quite shivered in her alarmed
confusion. "Your Mem Sahib said it was here. They did not order me, but
I thought I would come to you. I did not know it was forbidden."

"What was the book?" inquired Jane severely. "I will take it to her
ladyship."

But Ameerah was so frightened that she