"How pale you were!" said Lewis. "I thought you were ill. I must go up to see Mrs. Catherine to-morrow. How does she wear, the old lady? She must be getting very ancient now. But that girl is a pretty little thing. Who can she be--do you know, Anne? I thought of her being a companion, or something of that kind; but there was a little maid with her." "A relative of Mrs. Catherine's," said Anne, faintly. "A relative--oh! What if she cuts you out!" said Lewis.--"I should have thought you sure of a good place in Mrs. Catherine's will, Anne. But there is no saying what a little fairy like that may do." Anne Ross felt the pang of dependence bitterly that night. Lewis was too like his mother to make it light to her; and portionless, with her plain face, and fastidious taste, what could she ever look for but dependence. Marriage, that necessity, often enough an unhappy one, to which so many young women in her position must look, as to a profession, for home and means, could never be a matter of mercenary convenience to Anne, and honorable earning of her own bread was an impossibility. And from her own sombre prospects she could turn for relief to so few of the things or people around. Lewis, so carelessly unfeeling and indifferent, so blunted in perception--Norman, whose very life was so great a dread to her, remaining before her mind's eye for ever--and even the sunny, youthful face at the Tower, which had lifted its blue eyes so trustfully to her own--why did its remembrance, and Lewis's light words of comment on its girlish comeliness, strike so deep a chill of fear into her heart? Ah! clouds deeply gathering, heavily brooding over this nook of still and peaceful country, what new combinations were your dark mists to form?