Audrey

She paused to take breath, and to look with shrewish triumph at the girl

who leaned against the wall. "I like not waking up," said Audrey to

herself. "It were easier to die. Perhaps I am dying."

"And then out he walks to find and talk to you, and in sets your pretty

summer of all play and no work!" went on the other, in a high voice. "Oh,

there was kindness enough, once you had caught his fancy! I wonder if the

lady at Westover praised his kindness? They say she is a proud young lady:

I wonder if she liked your being at the ball last night? When she comes

to Fair View, I'll take my oath that you'll walk no more in its garden!

But perhaps she won't come now,--though her maid Chloe told Mistress

Bray's Martha that she certainly loves him"-"I wish I were dead," said Audrey. "I wish I were dead, like Molly." She

stood up straight against the wall, and pushed her heavy hair from her

forehead. "Be quiet now," she said. "You see that I am awake; there is no

need for further calling. I shall not dream again." She looked at the

older woman doubtfully. "Would you mind," she suggested,--"would you be so

very kind as to leave me alone, to sit here awake for a while? I have to

get used to it, you know. To-morrow, when we go back to the glebe house, I

will work the harder. It must be easy to work when one is awake. Dreaming

takes so much time."

Mistress Deborah could hardly have told why she did as she was asked.

Perhaps the very strangeness of the girl made her uncomfortable in her

presence; perhaps in her sour and withered heart there was yet some little

soundness of pity and comprehension; or perhaps it was only that she had

said her say, and was anxious to get to her friends below, and shake from

her soul the dust of any possible complicity with circumstance in moulding

the destinies of Darden's Audrey. Be that as it may, when she had flung

her hood upon the bed and had looked at herself in the cracked glass above

the dresser, she went out of the room, and closed the door somewhat softly

behind her.