Alas! so I might: the sorceress had conquered me in my last stronghold! At first Miss Russell would not hear of sitting for anything more finished and elaborate than a sketch in crayons, but from the sketch to a water-colour drawing, and from this again to an oil painting, the progression was rapid: at length the Stolen Child was wholly set aside and replaced on the easel by Medora. I had before lost Cornelius in the evening, in his moments of leisure and liberty, I now lost him at his labour; the intruder stepped in between him and me on the very spot where I thought myself most secure, and I had to look on and see it, for Miriam objected, it seems, to sitting to Cornelius alone; Kate had something else to do than to keep them company: the task was left to me. That Miriam should sit to Cornelius instead of me, was the least part of my grief; I had never expected that he would always paint little girls: the sitting in itself was nothing, but it led to much that it was acute misery for a jealous child like me to witness. I was not accustomed to be much noticed by Cornelius in the studio, but if he had a look to spare from his picture, a word to utter in a pause of his work, he gave both look and word to the child who sat to him, or silently watched him painting, and now this was taken from me! I was to my face robbed and impoverished, that another might be enriched with all I lost. For two years I had reigned in that studio, of which not even Kate shared the empire; for two years Cornelius had there spoken to me of his art, of his future, of everything that was linked with this proud aim and darling ambition of his life; and now another listened to his aspirations; another heard every passing thought and feeling which, though a child, it had once been mine to hear, and I had to look on and see it all. But it was not all.