No one else, not even Sarah, thought William intended more than to keep in Mr. Leopold's good graces, but Esther, although unable to guess the truth, heard the still tinkling bell ringing the knell of her hopes. She noted, too, the time he remained upstairs, and asked herself anxiously what it was that detained him so long. The weather had turned colder lately.... Was it a fire that was wanted? In the course of the afternoon, she heard from Margaret that Miss Mary and Mrs. Barfield had gone to Southwick to make a call, and she heard from one of the boys that the Gaffer and Ginger had ridden over in the morning to Fendon Fair, and had not yet returned. It must have been Peggy who had rung the bell. Peggy? Suddenly she remembered something--something that had been forgotten. The first Sunday, the first time she went to the library for family prayers, Peggy was sitting on the little green sofa, and as Esther passed across the room to her place she saw her cast a glance of admiration on William's tall figure, and the memory of that glance had flamed up in her brain, and all that night Esther saw the girl with the pale face and the coal-black hair looking at her William. Next day Esther waited for the bell that was to call her lover from her. The afternoon wore slowly away, and she had begun to hope she was mistaken when the metal tongue commenced calling. She heard the baize door close behind him; but the bell still continued to utter little pathetic notes. A moment after all was still in the corridor, and like one sunk to the knees in quicksands she felt that the time had come for a decided effort. But what could she do? She could not follow him to the drawing-room. She had begun to notice that he seemed to avoid her, and by his conduct seemed to wish that their quarrel might endure. But pride and temper had fallen from her, and she lived conscious of him, noting every sign, and intensely, all that related to him, divining all his intentions, and meeting him in the passage when he least expected her. "I'm always getting in your way," she said, with a low, nervous laugh. "No harm in that; ...fellow servants; there must be give and take." Tremblingly they looked at each other, feeling that the time had come, that an explanation was inevitable, but at that moment the drawing-room bell rang above their heads, and William said, "I must answer that bell." He turned from her, and passed through the baize door before she had said another word. Sarah remarked that William seemed to spend a great deal of his time in the drawing-room, and Esther started out of her moody contemplation, and, speaking instinctively, she said, "I don't think much of ladies who go after their servants." Everyone looked up. Mrs. Latch laid her carving-knife on the meat and fixed her eyes on her son. "Lady?" said Sarah; "she's no lady! Her mother used to mop out the yard before she was 'churched.'"