At length, when the day was nigh spent, and Agatha had dressed for the last of those formal dinners to which she had never been able quite to reconcile herself, she took refuge in Elizabeth's room. Thither she had of late absented herself; there was something so formidable in the keenness of Elizabeth's silent eyes. Hesitating before the door, she remembered when she had last quitted it. It required all her bravery to cross the threshold once more. “Come in. I hear your foot, Agatha.” There was no stepping back now. The same atmosphere of peace and sanctity pervading the pretty room; the same lights dancing through the painted window on the silk coverlet; the same face, which had all the colourless reality of death, without any of its ghastliness--a smiling repose, such as is seen only at the beginning and end of life's tumult--in the cradle and in the coffin. Its effect upon Agatha was instantaneous. Her trembling ceased; she stepped lightly, as one does in entering a holy place. “Elizabeth!” It seemed a beautiful name, a saint's name, and as such came quite naturally, though she had rarely before been so familiar with any one of her new sisters. She kneeled down and kissed Elizabeth. “That is right. You are good to come. And where have you been, my little sister?--I have not seen you for three days.” “Is it so long?” “Yes--though it may seem longer to me here. You remember you came and told me a long story about a Cornish miner. How did the tale end? What, no answer?” None. She tried to hide herself--crush herself into the very floor where she sat, out of reach of Elizabeth's eyes. “Ah, well, dear! I shall not ask.” “Perhaps my husband will tell you some day. Talk to me of something else, Elizabeth. And oh! however I may look and speak, don't notice me. Let me feel that I need not make pretences with you.” “You need not. Nothing that happens here goes beyond these four walls. Everybody tells me everything.” Elizabeth might well say this. There was that about her which made people fearless and free in their confidence; it did not seem like talking to a mortal woman, mixed up continually in the affairs of life, but to one removed to a different sphere, where there was no chance of betrayal. Her room was a safe confessional, and she was a sort of general conscience in the house. “Everybody tells you everything,” repeated Agatha. “Does my husband?” “Not yet; at least not in words.” “Then I will not. Only let me come here, and”-- She covered her face, and for a few moments wept fully and freely, as one weep's before one's own heart and before God. Then she dried her eyes, and the storm was over. Elizabeth only said, “Poor child--poor child. Wait!” But the one word struck like a sun-ray through darkness. No one ever “waited” but had some hopeful ending to wait for. “Now,” said Agatha, overcoming her weakness--“now let us talk. What have you been doing all day?”