"Where is your watch, Ellen? and why, if you are not wearing it, do you make us suppose you are?" interrupted Mrs. Hamilton, startled out of all idea that Ellen was changed only in fancy. Ellen was silent, and to Percy's imagination, so sullenly and insolently so, that he became indignant. "Did you hear my mother speak to you, Ellen? Why don't you answer?" "Because I thought my watch was my own to do what I liked with, to wear or to put away," was the reply; over neither words nor tone of which, had she at that moment any control, for in her agonized terror, she did not in the least know what she said. "How dare you answer so, Ellen? Leave the room, or ask my mother's pardon at once," replied Percy, his eyes flashing with such unusual anger that it terrified her still more, and under the same kind of spell she was turning to obey him, without attempting the apology he demanded. "Stay, Ellen; this extraordinary conduct must not go on any longer without notice on my part. I have borne with it, I fear, too long already. Leave us, my dear Percy; I would rather speak with your cousin alone." "I fear it will be useless, mother; what has come over Ellen I _can not_ imagine, but I never saw such an incomprehensible change in my life." He departed, unconscious that Ellen, who was near the door transfixed at her aunt's words, made a rapid movement as to catch hold of his arm, and that the words, "Do not go, Percy, for pity's sake!" trembled on her pale lips, but they emitted no sound. What passed in the interview, which lasted more than an hour, no one knew; but to the watchful eyes of her affectionate children, there were traces of very unusual disturbance on Mrs. Hamilton's expressive countenance when she rejoined them; and the dark rim round Ellen's eyes, the deadly pallor of her cheeks and lips seemed to denote that it had not been deficient in suffering to her; though not one sign of penitence, one word of acknowledgment that she was, and had been for some weeks in error, by her extraordinary conduct--not even a softening tear could her aunt elicit. She had never before so failed--never, not even when the disappearance of her allowance had caused extreme displeasure, had Ellen evinced such an apparently sullen spirit of determined hardihood. She would not attempt defense or reply to the acted falsehood with which she was charged, of appearing to wear her watch when she did not, or to say what she had done with it. Mrs. Hamilton spoke to her till she was almost exhausted, for her own disappointment was most painful, and she had not a gleam of hope to urge her on. Her concluding words were these--