And when at last she rose, first loosening and then twisting the black masses of her hair, it seemed to her that the form in the glass was that of another woman, treading another earth. She trampled cowardice under foot; she freed herself from--"was uns alle bändigt, das Gemeine!" Then as she stood before the oval mirror in a classical frame, which adorned the mantel-piece of what had once been Lady Mary Leicester's room, her eye was vaguely caught by the little family pictures and texts which hung on either side of it. Lady Mary and her sister as children, their plain faces emerging timidly from their white, high-waisted frocks; Lady 'Mary's mother, an old lady in a white coif and kerchief, wearing a look austerely kind; on the other side a clergyman, perhaps the brother of the old lady, with a similar type of face, though gentler--a face nourished on the _Christian Year_; and above and below them two or three card-board texts, carefully illuminated by Lady Mary Leicester herself: "Thou, Lord, knowest my down-sitting and my uprising." "Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow." "Fear not, little flock. It is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom." * * * * * Julie observed these fragments, absently at first, then with repulsion. This Anglican pietism, so well fed, so narrowly sheltered, which measured the universe with its foot-rule, seemed to her quasi-Catholic eye merely fatuous and hypocritical. It is not by such forces, she thought, that the true world of men and women is governed. As she turned away she noticed two little Catholic pictures, such as she had been accustomed in her convent days to carry in her books of devotion, carefully propped up beneath the texts. "Ah, Thérèse!" she said to herself, with a sudden feeling of pain. "Is the child asleep?" She listened. A little cough sounded from the neighboring room. Julie crossed the landing. "Thérèse! tu ne dors pas encore?" A voice said, softly, in the darkness, "Je t'attendais, mademoiselle." Julie went to the child's bed, put down her candle, and stooped to kiss her. The child's thin hand caressed her cheek. "Ah, it will be good--to be in Bruges--with mademoiselle." Julie drew herself away. "I sha'n't be there to-morrow, dear." "Not there! Oh, mademoiselle!" The child's voice was pitiful. "I shall join you there. But I find I must go to Paris first. I--I have some business there." "But maman said--" "Yes, I have only just made up my mind. I shall tell maman to-morrow morning," "You go alone, mademoiselle?" "Why not, dear goose?" "Vous êtes fatiguée. I would like to come with you, and carry your cloak and the umbrellas." "You, indeed!" said Julie. "It would end, wouldn't it, in my carrying you--besides the cloak and the umbrellas?" Then she knelt down beside the child and took her in her arms. "Do you love me, Thérèse?"