"Is he?" said May, indifferently; "you seem to imply that others are different--and indeed I think that it would be much more comfortable to have a heart like other people." "Oh, May!" "I wish you would stop all that," cried May, angrily; "when you get into one of your moods, Julia, you are intolerable. I wish you would let Nelly Brunton alone: I don't see anything remarkable about her," the girl said with a toss of her head, walking back into the drawing-room, where she flung the piano open, and began to sing in the most defiant manner. It was a wet day, the lawn swept by a white blast of rain, and all the trees cowering piteously as if running in for shelter. Poor Miss Bampton sat down in a deep chair to hide herself, feeling as if she had been the occasion of all that had happened, and that it was natural she should suffer accordingly. And when presently May ran singing up-stairs, and the door of her room was heard to shut upon her, poor Julia did not follow. She dared not follow; for the first time in her life poor little May, now finding out what it was to be grown up and a woman, had to bear her moment of bitterness by herself. I need not say that Julia cried silently all the time, sunk in the depths of the big chair, so that Mr Bampton when he came in, in quest of tea or something to break the dulness of the afternoon, saw nobody in the room, and went out again calling indignantly for Ju and Maysey, and demanding of the butler in angry tones whether this afternoon of all others, when no one could go out or do anything to amuse oneself, there was to be no tea. CHAPTER V.