g in he found himself alone with Arabella. "Oh, Mr. Gibson," she
said, "we weren't sure whether you'd come. And mamma and Camilla have
gone out to Mrs. Camadge's." Mr. Gibson muttered some word to the
effect that he hoped he had kept nobody at home; and, as he did so,
he remembered that he had distinctly said that he would come on
this evening. "I don't know that I should have gone," said Arabella,
"because I am not quite,--not quite myself at present. No, not ill;
not at all. Don't you know what it is, Mr. Gibson, to be,--to be,--to
be,--not quite yourself?" Mr. Gibson said that he had very often felt
like that. "And one can't get over it;--can one?" continued Arabella.
"There comes a presentiment that something is going to happen, and
a kind of belief that something has happened, though you don't know
what; and the heart refuses to be light, and the spirit becomes
abashed, and the mind, though it creates new thoughts, will not
settle itself to its accustomed work. I suppose it's what the novels
have called Melancholy."

"I suppose it is," said Mr. Gibson. "But there's generally some cause
for it. Debt for instance--"

"It's nothing of that kind with me. It's no debt, at least, that can
be written down in the figures of ordinary arithmetic. Sit down, Mr.
Gibson, and we will have some tea." Then, as she stretched forward to
ring the bell, he thought that he never in his life had seen anything
so unshapely as that huge wen at the back of her head. "Monstrum
horrendum, informe, ingens!" He could not help quoting the words to
himself. She was dressed with some attempt at being smart, but her
ribbons were soiled, and her lace was tawdry, and the fabric of her
dress was old and dowdy. He was quite sure that he would feel no
pride in calling her Mrs. Gibson, no pleasure in having her all to
himself at his own hearth. "I hope we shall escape the bitterness of
Miss Stanbury's tongue if we drink tea tete-a-tete," she said, with
her sweetest smile.

"I don't suppose she'll know anything about it."

"She knows about everything, Mr. Gibson. It's astonishing what she
knows. She has eyes and ears everywhere. I shouldn't care, if she
didn't see and hear so very incorrectly. I'm told now that she
declares--; but it doesn't signify."

"Declares what?" asked Mr. Gibson.

"Never mind. But wasn't it odd how all Exeter believed that you were
going to be married in that house, and to live there all the rest of
your life, and be one o