"But Grandmamma would never--" I said, hesitatingly. "Annas Keith's connections are--" "I advise you not to be too sure what she could never," answered Miss Newton, with a little capable nod. "Mrs Desborough would scarce be civil to the Princess herself if she sang a pious song in her drawing-room on a reception evening." "But it was charming!" I said. Miss Newton shrugged her shoulders. "The same things do not charm everybody," said she. "It seemed to me no better than that Methodist doggerel. The latter half, at least; the beginning promised better." When we went up to bed, Annas came to me as I stood folding my shoulder-knots, and laid a hand on each of my shoulders from behind. "Cary, we must say `good-bye,' I think. I scarce expected it. But Mrs Desborough's face, when my song was ended, had `good-bye' in it." "O Annas!" said I. "Surely she would never be angry with you for a mere song! Your connections are so good, and Grandmamma thinks so much of connections." "If my song had only had a few wicked words in it," replied Annas, with that slight curl of her lip which I was learning to understand, "I dare say she would have recovered it by to-morrow. And if my connections had been poor people,--or better, Whigs,--or better still, disreputable rakes--she might have got over that. But a pious song, and a sisterly connection of spirit with Mr Whitefield and the Scottish Covenanters. No, Cary, she will not survive that. I never yet knew a worldly woman forgive that one crime of crimes--Calvinism. Anything else! Don't you see why, my dear? It sets her outside. And she knows that I know she is outside. Therefore I am unforgivable. However absurd the idea may be in reality, it is to her mind equivalent to my setting her outside. She is unable to recognise that she has chosen to stay without, and I am guilty of nothing worse than unavoidably seeing that she is there. That I should be able to see it is unpardonable. I am sorry it should have happened just now; but I suppose it was to be." "Are you going to tell her so?" I asked, wondering what Annas meant. "I expect she will tell me before to-morrow is over," said Annas, with a peculiar smile. "But what made you choose that song, then? I thought it so pretty." "I chose the one I knew, to which I supposed she would object the least," replied Annas. "She asked me to sing." When we came down to breakfast, the next morning, I felt that something was in the air. Grandmamma sat so particularly straight up, and my Aunt Dorothea looked so prim, and my Uncle Charles fidgetted about between the fire and the window, like a man who knew of something coming which he wanted to have over. My Aunt Dorothea poured the chocolate in silence. When all were served, Grandmamma took a pinch of snuff. "Miss Keith!" "Madam!" "Do you think the air of the Isle of Wight wholesome at this season of the year?"