Anne did not like it. Hitherto mistress of all things under her father, she found herself passed over as a nonentity. She might not express an opinion, or hazard a wish. "My dear, _I_ am here now," Mrs. Lewis said to her once or twice emphatically. Anne was deposed; her reign was over. One little thing, that happened, she certainly did not like. Though humble-minded, entirely without self-assertion, sweet-tempered and modest as a girl should be, she did not like this. Mrs. Lewis sent out invitations for dinner to some people in the neighbourhood, strangers to her until then; the table was too full by one, and she had told Anne that she could not sit down. It was too bad; especially as Julia and Fanny Podd filled two of the more important places, with bunches of fresh sweet-peas in their hair. "Besides," Mrs. Lewis had said to Anne in the morning, "we must have a French side-dish or two, and there's no one but you understands the making of them." Whether having to play the host was too much for him, or that he did not like the slight put upon his daughter, before the dinner was half over, the doctor fell asleep. He could not be roused from it. Herbert Tanerton, who had sat by Mrs. Lewis's side to say grace, thought it was not sleep but unconsciousness. Between them the company carried him into the other room; and Anne, hastening to send in her French dishes, ran there to attend upon him. "I hope and trust there's nothing amiss with his heart," said old Coney doubtfully, in the bride's ear. "My dear Mr. Coney, his heart is as strong as mine--believe me," affirmed Mrs. Lewis, flicking some crumbs off the front of her wedding-dress. "I hope it is, I'm sure," repeated Coney. "I don't like that blue tinge round his lips." They went back to the dinner-table when Dr. Lewis revived. Anne remained kneeling at his feet, gently chafing his hands. "What's the matter?" he cried, staring at her like a man bewildered. "What are you doing?" "Dear papa, you fell asleep over your dinner, and they could not wake you. Do you feel ill?" "Where am I?" he asked, as if he were speaking out of a dream. And she told him what she could. But she had not heard those suspicious words of old Coney's. It was some minutes yet before he got much sense into him, or seemed fully to understand. He fell back in the chair then, with a deep sigh, keeping Anne's hand in his. "Shall I get you anything, papa?" she asked. "You had eaten scarcely any dinner, they say. Would you like a little drop of brandy-and-water?" "Why was not your dress ready?" "My dress!" exclaimed Anne. "She said so to me, when I asked why you did not come to table. Not made, or washed, or ironed; or something." Anne felt rather at sea. "There's nothing the matter with my dresses, papa," she said. "But never mind them--or me. Will you go back to dinner? Or shall I get you anything here?" "I don't want to go back; I don't want anything," he answered. "Go and finish yours, my dear."