ad held to it, urged by feelings
which he had found it difficult to analyse. Rachel had in her
sickness determined to have done with him altogether, but latterly
she had had no communication with him. She had spoken of him to her
father as though he were a being simply to be forgotten. "He has
gone away, and, as far as he is concerned, there is an end of me.
It could not have finished better." But her mind still referred to
Frank Jones, and from him she had received hardly a word of love.
Further words of love she could not send him. During her illness many
letters, or little notes rather, had been written to Castle Morony on
her behalf by her father, and to these there had come replies. Frank
was so anxious to hear of her well-doing. Frank had not cared so much
for her voice as for her general health. Frank was so sorry to hear
of her weakness. It had all been read to her, but as it had been read
she had only shaken her head; and her father had not carried the
dream on any further. To his thinking she was still engaged to the
lord, and it would be better for her that she should marry the lord.
The lord no doubt was a fool, and filled the most foolish place in
the world,--that of a silly faineant earl. But he would do no harm to
his daughter, and the girl would learn to like the kind of life which
would be hers. At present she was very, very ill, but still there was
hope for recovery.

By the treasury of the theatre she had been treated munificently. Her
engagement had been almost up to the day fixed for her marriage, and
the money which would have become due to her under it had been paid
in full. She had sent back the latter payments, but they had been
returned to her with the affectionate respects of the managers. Since
she had put her foot upon these boards she had found herself to be
popular with all around her. That, she had told herself, had been due
to the lord who was to become her husband. But Rachel had become, and
was likely to become, the means of earning money for them, and they
were grateful. To tell the truth, Lord Castlewell had had nothing to
do with it.

But gradually there came upon them the conviction that her voice was
gone, and then the payment of the money ceased. She, and the doctor,
and her father, had discussed it together, and they had agreed to
settle that it must be so.

"Yes," said the girl, smiling, "it is bitter. All my hopes! And such
hopes! It is as though I were dead, and yet were