ould bear to do--or say--anything that gave him pain."

She spoke with a sweet seriousness. Mrs. Colwood, who had been conscious
of a slight shock of puzzled recollection, gave an answer which
evidently pleased Diana, for the girl held out her hand and pressed that
of her companion; then they carried the box to its place, and were
leaving the room, when suddenly Diana, with a joyous exclamation,
pounced on a book which was lying on the floor, tumbled among a dozen
others recently unpacked.

"Mr. Marsham's Rossetti! I _am_ glad. Now I can face him!"

She looked up all smiles.

"Do you know that I am going to take you to a party next week?--to the
Marshams? They live near here--at Tallyn Hall. They have asked us for
two nights--Thursday to Saturday. I hope you won't mind."

"Have I got a dress?" said Mrs. Colwood, anxiously.

"Oh, that doesn't matter!--not at the Marshams. I _am_ glad!" repeated
Diana, fondling the book--"If I really had lost it, it would have given
him a horrid advantage!"

"Who is Mr. Marsham?"

"A gentleman we got to know at Rapallo," said Diana, still smiling to
herself. "He and his mother were there last winter. Father and I
quarrelled with him all day long. He is the worst Radical I ever
met, but--"

"But?--but agreeable?"

"Oh yes," said Diana, uncertainly, and Mrs. Colwood thought she
colored--"oh yes--agreeable!"

"And he lives near here?"

"He is the member for the division. Such a crew as we shall meet there!"
Diana laughed out. "I had better warn you. But they have been very kind.
They called directly they knew I had taken the house. 'They' means Mr.
Oliver Marsham and his mother. I _am_ glad I've found his book!" She
went off embracing it.

Mrs. Colwood was left with two impressions--one sharp, the other vague.
One was that Mr. Oliver Marsham might easily become a personage in the
story of which she had just, as it were, turned the first leaf. The
other was connected with the name on the despatch-box. Why did it haunt
her? It had produced a kind of indistinguishable echo in the brain, to
which she could put no words--which was none the less dreary; like a
voice of wailing from a far-off past.

CHAPTER II

During the days immediately following her arrival at Beechcote, Mrs.
Colwood applied herself to a study of Miss Mallory and her
surroundings--none the less penetrating because the student was modest
and her method unperceived. She divined a nature unworldly, impul