Cara did not like to look round her as it came to be dark, lest she see _some one_ sitting in the corner in the shadow. It seemed to her more than once that somebody moved in the distance, going out or coming in, with a sweep of a long skirt, just disappearing as she looked up. This meant, I suppose (or at least so many people would say), that her digestion was not in such good order as it should have been--but digestion was not a thing which came within Cara’s range of thought. Her father arrived about half-past six by the Continental train. Cara stood at the door of the drawing-room, with her heart beating, wondering if she ought to run down and receive him, or if he would come to her. She heard him ask if she had come, and then he added, ‘I will go to my room at once, John. I suppose dinner is nearly ready. I did not expect to have been so late. Bring my things to my room.’ ‘Shall I call Miss Cara, sir?’ ‘No; never mind. I shall see her at dinner,’ he said. And Cara instinctively closed the drawing-room door at which she had been standing, as she heard him begin to come up the stairs. She stood there, with her heart beating, in case he should call her; but he did not. Then she too went to dress, with a chilled and stifled sensation, the first sense of repulse which she had ever experienced. When she was ready, she went back again very quickly and noiselessly, leaving the door open. By-and-by her father’s step became audible coming down, and he paused when he got to the door; but then resumed and went on again, sending her word that she would find him in the dining-room. It was unreasonable, the high swelling of offence and injured pride that she felt in her heart--but there it was. Was this how he meant to use her--her, his only child--now the mistress of his house? She went down, after an interval of proud and painful reluctance, a slim, girlish creature, in her white dress, her blue eyes somewhat strained and large, more widely opened than was consistent with perfect composure. She was not beautiful, like her mother. A certain visionary youthful severity was in her looks. She was different altogether, different in every way, from the pet and darling of the ladies at the Hill. Her father had not seen her since she had leaped into long dresses and young-womanhood, and he was startled by the change. Involuntarily, as he looked at her, her mother’s description of the child Cara came back to his mind. Perhaps he was all the more quick to notice this that his eye had been caught as he paused at the drawing-room door by the last purchase he had made in bric-à-brac, the Buen Retiro cup, of which his wife had said playfully that Cara would insist that he should tell the dealer the exact value before he bought it. This strange idea brought a half smile to his face, and yet his memories were so far from smiling. The cup had been broken to bits in the careless packing of that last journey home, when