, or impatient, hand shook the
door-latch.

"Not permitted!" cried Irene, and she asked:

"Who is there?"

There was no answer, but the latch moved again, though in a
timid, and, as it were, imploring manner.

"You cannot come in," repeated Irene.

There was a rustle against the sofa outside, a light and quick
step moved away.

"Cara!" whispered Malvina.

"For her as well as for ourselves there is need to end this
position at the earliest," said Irene, with a sudden frown.

It was Cara; she had left the door of her mother's room with
drooping head, with a great frown on her forehead, and no thought
for the little dog, tugging at her skirt as usual. Half an hour
before, when Maryan and Miss Mary had risen from chess, she rose,
too, pushed her hand under her brother's arm and said:

"I have something to say to you."

Her seriousness was so evident that Maryan answered, with a
smile:

"If your speech is to be as solemn as your face is we shall have
little joy. What have you to tell me?"

Without answering she led him through the blue drawing-room to
the next one more faintly lighted. Here she halted, looked
around, and, seeing only inanimate objects, asked:

"Why have you quarrelled with father?"

This question in her mouth astonished him, and he asked in turn:

"Why do you wish this information? You might dream of the role of
peacemaker."

Without a shade of laughter, with forehead somewhat wrinkled
beneath bright curls of hair, she repeated the question:

"Why have you quarrelled with father? Do you not love him? Why
can you not love him? For me, father is an ideal! He is so wise,
noble, great. When he was so long away I dreamed about him,
wanted his return, imagined how happy we should all be when he
came. But that is not the case in any way. All in the house seem
to be at variance, angry, disappointed--I see this well, but I
cannot understand why. Why? why is it?"

Maryan fixed his eyes on her attentively and laughed, but his
laugh was not sincere, it was forced.

"Curiosity," said he, "is the first step toward hell, and the
surest road to premature age. You will grow old before your time,
little one."

"This is not curiosity!" interrupted Cara. "There is some kind of
trouble here, I know not what it is; but something so unpleasant
and--dreadful. Sometimes it seems to me that someone will die, or
that something will vanish, and that, in general, something
awfully bad will happen to somebod