bviously easy to hurt and crush physically. That was
her allure, her most noticeable quality--that she presented
unconsciously, but unmistakably, the suggestion that it would be easy to
hurt her, easy and sweet.

She made trial of her hair in the fashion the new Princess had
started--drawn back _a la chinoise_, with a long rolled curl, known for
some reason as a "_repentir_," brought forward to lie over one shoulder.
Then she went to the washstand and took more care than usual over the
cleansing of her hands. That done, she deliberated whether or not to
put on her grey chip hat with the pink plume that on her arrival she had
flung on the bed, where it still lay. She tried herself with it and
without, then debated as to whether it looked better to give the
impression of being one of the family by appearing bonnetless, or
whether, on the other hand, it would not be more interesting to Ishmael
if he got the impression of a visitor ... of someone who was not always
about the house, who was to be seen outside. She finally decided on the
latter. Then she sat down to wait, though the time was bound to be more
than an hour, since Vassie and John-James had only now started in to
Penzance in the smart new market-cart to meet the eagerly awaited
arrival, Ishmael Ruan.

Downstairs Annie too had her deliberations, her changes of mind, her
sudden impulses of affection and of resentment, as her ill-regulated
brain had always had them. She had not changed much in the years that
had brought them past Ishmael's eighteenth birthday. All of worn tissues
and faded tints had been hers long before, and except for an increased
jerkiness she seemed the same. In attire she had altered, and her black
silk dress, with its scallops and trembling fringes, suited ill enough
with her badly-arranged hair and work-worn hands.

She sat in the little parlour, which she had been made to take into use
by Vassie, who had successfully made it hideous with antimacassars and
vases of artificial flowers. As Annie sat rigidly upright upon a
slippery horsehair-covered chair, her eyes wandered vaguely here and
there and fell on the album in which Vassie had collected all the
photographs taken of the family from time to time. Photographs printed
on paper were only just beginning to supersede the older daguerreotypes,
and a gleam of interest came into Annie's pale blue eyes, for the album
was still a new toy to her. She remembered that Vassie had only lately
finis