"This rebellious spirit must be conquered," he said, on rejoining Mrs. Hamilton, who, with her children and Miss Harcourt, had most anxiously and yet hopefully awaited the result of his interference. "We should actually be sharing her sin, if we permit her to conquer us by obduracy and self-will. Solitary confinement and complete idleness may bring her to a better temper, and, in fact, should be persisted in, till a full confession be made. If that fail, my dear Mrs. Hamilton, your niece should be banished from Oakwood. She must not remain here, a continual source of anxiety and misery to you, and of successful hardihood to herself; but of that there will be time enough to think when you have an answer from Mr. Hamilton; his judgment from a distance may be wiser than ours on the spot, and irritated as we are by such unaccountable obstinacy in one we have always thought almost too yielding." And it was this incomprehensible change of character, in seeming, that still more perplexed Mrs. Hamilton, and so made her believe there must be some worse fault, or dangerous entanglement, demanding such resolute pertinacity in concealment. Closely connected with Ellis's private apartments, and having neither inlet nor outlet, save through the short passage opening from her sitting-room, were two small but not uncomfortable apartments, opening one into the other, and looking out on a very pretty but quite unfrequented part of the park. They had often been used when any of Ellis's children or grandchildren came to see her, and were in consequence almost sufficiently habitable, without any further preparation, except the turning one into a sitting-room, which Ellis's active care speedily accomplished. Her mistress inspected them, at her desire, suggested one or two additional comforts, and then held a long confidential conversation with her. She had such perfect confidence in her (for Ellis had been from a child--married, and become mother and widow, and married her children--all as an inmate of the Hamilton family, and had held the confidential post of housekeeper for sixteen years), that she did not hesitate one moment to commit Ellen entirely to her care, at least till she could receive an answer about her from her husband. She depended on her to watch over her health, to see that she took daily exercise with her, in those parts of the park where she was not likely to attract notice, as being with her instead of with any member of her family, and that she took her regular meals; to be with her whenever she took them, and at casual times in the day, not so as to remove the impression of solitude and disgrace, but to be enabled to watch her closely, and the least symptom of a softening spirit to report instantly to her.