In the house itself nothing was new; even the servants were the same
Miriam had left there. Mrs. Fletcher lived precisely the life of three
and a half years ago, down to the most trivial habit; used the same
phrases, wore the same kind of dress. To Miriam everything seemed
unreal, visionary; her own voice sounded strange, for it was out of
harmony with this resuscitated world. She went up to the room prepared
for her, and tried to shake off the nightmare oppression. The
difficulty was to keep a natural consciousness of her own identity.
Above all, the scents in the air disturbed her, confused her mind,
forced her to think in forgotten ways about the things on which her
eyes fell.

The impressions of every moment were disagreeable, now and then acutely
painful. To what purpose had she faced this experience? She might have
foreseen what the result would be, and her presence here was
unnecessary.

But in an hour, when her pulse again beat temperately, she began to
adjust the relations between herself and these surroundings. They no
longer oppressed her; the sense of superiority which had been pleasant
at a distance re-established itself, and gave her a defiant strength
such as she had hoped for. So far from the anxieties of her conscience
being aggravated by return to Bartles, she could not recover that mode
of feeling which had harassed her for the last few months. Like so many
other things, it had become insubstantial. It might revive, but for the
present she was safe against it.

And this self-possession was greatly aided by Mrs. Fletcher's talk.
Prom her sister-in-law's letters, though for the last two years they
had been few, Miriam had formed some conception of the progress of
Bartles opinion concerning herself. Now she led Mrs. Fletcher to
converse with native candour on this subject, and in the course of the
evening, which they spent alone, all the town's gossip since Miriam's
going abroad was gradually reported. Mrs. Fletcher was careful to
prevent the inference (which would have been substantially correct)
that she herself had been the source of such rumours as had set wagging
the tongues of dissident Bartles; she spoke with much show of
reluctance, and many protestations of the wrath that had been excited
in her by those who were credulous of ill. Miriam confined herself to
questioning; she made no verbal comments. But occasionally she averted
her face with a haughty smile.

Mrs. Welland, the once-dreaded