even in the sleepy stillness of the house, and the sole preface they had to her appearance in the parlor was a shadow of something black which crossed the light, and the softest visionary tap at the door. Then the old woman stood suddenly before the mother and the daughter, who were sitting together dull enough. Mrs. Preston was still poorly, and disturbed in her mind. And as for Pamela, poor child, it was a trying moment for her. As from a watch-tower, she could see what was going on at Brownlows, and knew that they were amusing themselves, and had all kinds of pleasant parties, in which Jack, who was hers and no other woman’s, took the chief part; and that amid all these diversions he had no time to come to see her though she had the only right to him, and that other girls were by, better born, better mannered, better dressed, and more charming than her simple self. Would it be his fault if he were fickle? How could he help being fickle with attractions so much greater around him? This was how Pamela was thinking as she sat by the sofa on which her mother lay. It was not weather for much exertion, and in the peculiar position of affairs, it was painful for these two to run the risk of meeting anybody from Brownlows; therefore they did not go out except furtively now and then at night, and sat all day in the house, and brooded, and were not very cheerful. Every laugh she heard sounding down the avenue, every carriage that drove out of or into the gates, every stray bit of gossip about the doings at the great house, and the luncheon parties at the cover-side, and the new arrivals, sounded to poor little Pamela like an injury. She had meant to be so happy and she was not happy. Only the sound of the guns was a little comfort to her. To be sure when he was shooting he was still amusing himself away from her; but at the same time he was not near the fatal beauties whom every evening Pamela felt in her heart he must be talking to, and smiling upon, and growing bewitched by. Such was the tenor of her thoughts as she sat by the sofa working, when old Nancy came in so suddenly at the door. Pamela sprang up from her seat. Her nerves were out of order, and even her temper, poor child! and all her delicate organization set on edge “It is _her_ again! and oh, what do you want?” said Pamela, with a little shriek. As for Mrs. Preston, she too sat bolt upright on the sofa and started not without a certain fright, at the sudden apparition. “Nancy Christian!” she said, clasping her hands together; “Nancy Christian! Is this _you_?” “Yes, it’s me,” said Nancy; “I said I would come, and here I am, and I’ve a deal to say. If you don’t mind, I’ll take a chair, for it’s a long way walking in this heat, all the way from Masterton.” This she said without a blush, though she had been set down not fifty yards off from the carrier’s cart.