And even to Jane Erskine her manner was cold. Her chilling philosophy would soon have quenched a less happy and impulsive nature. No one but Jane would have bothered her head about Mrs. Ogilvie, the kindly neighbours said, envying, nevertheless, the girl's intimacy at the great house. But as a matter of fact Jane expended a wealth of honest affection on Mrs. Ogilvie, and not only thought her the cleverest woman she had ever met, but had even been heard to affirm that her hair was not dyed. She called her 'such a really good sort'; and the words were as inappropriate as the words of Peter Ogilvie and Jane Erskine usually were. CHAPTER II Jane Erskine was at the present time at that interesting period when her friends and relatives, having just discovered the unexpected fact that she was grown up, subjected her to mildly severe criticism, while believing that to have reached womanhood at all showed a considerable amount of talent on her part. They were, they said, under no misapprehension about Jane; in moments of extreme candour, touched with responsibility, they had even been known to say that in one or two respects she was not absolutely perfect. Miss Abingdon, for instance, who always conscientiously encouraged these moods, and censured the General for spoiling Jane, would frequently compare her niece with herself, as she remembered that dim figure of girlhood, and never failed to find cause for unfavourable comparison between the two. From the portraits which she drew it was generally believed that Miss Abingdon must have been born rather a strait-laced spinster of thirty, and have increased in wisdom until her hair was touched with grey; when she would seem to have become the mellow, severe, dignified, loving, and critical lady who at this moment was looking out of her drawing-room window, and trying to show her impartiality for her orphan niece by subjecting her to lawful and unbiased criticism. 'The day of the incomprehensible woman is past and gone,' said Miss Abingdon, and she sighed a little. Jane Erskine was painting a rabbit-hutch on the lawn. Her attitude showed the keen workman, but disguised the woman of grace. Miss Erskine, in fact, was lying full-length on the greensward of her aunt's lawn absorbed in the engrossing occupation of putting the right dabs of green paint upon a portion of the inside of the rabbit-hutch which was awkward to get at.