ith that harshness.

The dinner went on much as usual, but Madeline could not bring
herself to say a word. She sat between her brother-in-law, Mr.
Arbuthnot, on one side, and an old friend of her father's, of thirty
years' standing, on the other. The old friend talked exclusively to
Lady Staveley, and Mr. Arbuthnot, though he now and then uttered a
word or two, was chiefly occupied with his dinner. During the last
three or four days she had sat at dinner next to Peregrine Orme, and
it seemed to her now that she always had been able to talk to him.
She had liked him so much too! Was it not a pity that he should have
been so mistaken! And then as she sat after dinner, eating five or
six grapes, she felt that she was unable to recall her spirits and
look and speak as she was wont to do: a thing had happened which had
knocked the ground from under her--had thrown her from her equipoise,
and now she lacked the strength to recover herself and hide her
dismay.

After dinner, while the gentlemen were still in the dining-room, she
got a book, and nobody disturbed her as she sat alone pretending to
read it. There never had been any intimate friendship between her and
Miss Furnival, and that young lady was now employed in taking the
chief part in a general conversation about wools. Lady Staveley got
through a good deal of wool in the course of the year, as also did
the wife of the old thirty-years' friend; but Miss Furnival, short as
her experience had been, was able to give a few hints to them both,
and did not throw away the occasion. There was another lady there,
rather deaf, to whom Mrs. Arbuthnot devoted herself, and therefore
Madeline was allowed to be alone.

Then the men came in, and she was obliged to come forward and
officiate at the tea-table. The judge insisted on having the teapot
and urn brought into the drawing-room, and liked to have his cup
brought to him by one of his own daughters. So she went to work and
made the tea; but still she felt that she scarcely knew how to go
through her task. What had happened to her that she should be thus
beside herself, and hardly capable of refraining from open tears?
She knew that her mother was looking at her, and that now and again
little things were done to give her ease if any ease were possible.

"Is anything the matter with my Madeline?" said her father, looking
up into her face, and holding the hand from which he had taken his
cup.

"No, papa; only I have got a hea