"Don't trouble yourself, madam; I am not at all afraid of poisonous things; I have become accustomed to them." Smiling bitterly, she stooped to pick up her new bonnet, which had fallen on the grass at her feet, and, fixing her eyes defiantly on the handsome face before her, said resolutely: "No! contemptible as you think me, beggarly and wretched as you please to term me, I have too much self-respect to stay a day longer where I have been so grossly, so needlessly insulted. You need not seek to detain me. Take your hand off my arm. I am going now; the sooner, the better. I understand, madam, your brother will not countenance your cruelty, and you are ashamed for him to know what, in his absence, you were not ashamed to do. I scorn to retaliate! He shall not learn from me why I left so suddenly. Tell him what you choose." Mrs. Chilton was very pale, and her lips were compressed till they grew purple. Clinching her hand, she said under her breath: "You artful little wretch. Am I to be thwarted by such a mere child? You shall not quit the house. Go to your room, and don't make a fool of yourself. In future I shall not concern myself about you, if you take root at the front door. Go in, and let matters stand. I promise you I will not interfere again, no matter what you do. Do you hear me?" "No. You have neither the power to detain nor to expel me. I shall leave here immediately, and you need not attempt to coerce me; for, if you do, I will acquaint Dr. Hartwell with the whole affair, as soon as he comes, or when I see him. I am going for my clothes; not those you so reluctantly had made, but the old garments I wore when I worked for my bread." She shook off the detaining hand, and went up to her room. Harriet had already lighted her lamp, and, as she entered the door, the rays fell brightly on the picture she had learned to love so well. Now she looked at it through scalding tears, and, to her excited fancy, the smile seemed to have faded from the lips of Hope, and the valley looked more dreary, and the pilgrims more desolate and miserable. She turned from it, and, taking off the clothes she wore, dressed herself in the humble apparel of former days. The old trunk was scarcely worth keeping, save as a relic; and folding up the clothes and books into as small a bundle as possible, she took it in her arms and descended the steps. She wished very much to tell Harriet good-by, and thank her for her unvarying kindness; and now, on the eve of her departure, she remembered the words whispered during her illness, and the offer of assistance when she "got into trouble," as Harriet phrased it; but, dreading to meet Mrs. Chilton again, she hurried down the hall, and left the house. The friendly stars looked kindly down upon the orphan, as she crossed the common, and proceeded toward the asylum, and raising her eyes to the jeweled dome, the solemn beauty of the night hushed the wild tumult in her heart, and she seemed to hear