Miss Leech, too, looked exceedingly pleased. How could she be anything but pleased at the prospect of staying with a person who was always so kind and thoughtful as Anna? Her feelings, somehow, were never hurt by Anna; Lady Estcourt seemed to have a special knack of jumping on them every time she spoke to her. She knew she ought not to have such sensitive feelings, and felt that it was more her fault than anyone else's if they were hurt; yet there they were, and being hurt was painful, and living with someone so even tempered as Anna was very peaceful and pleasant. Mr. Jessup would have liked Anna. She wished he could have known her. A higher compliment it was not in Miss Leech's power to pay. And when Anna saw the pleasure on Miss Leech's face, and saw that she thought she was to stay too, she felt that for no sister-in-law in the world would she wipe it out with that month's notice. She decided to say nothing, but simply to keep her as well as Letty. Her two thousand a year was in her eyes of infinite elasticity. Never having had any money, she had no notion of how far it would go; and she did not hesitate to come to a decision which would probably ultimately oblige her to reduce the number of those persons Susie described as victims. The next day the companion arrived. Anna went out into the hall to meet her when she heard the approaching wheels of the shepherd-plaid chariot. She felt rather nervous as she watched her emerging from beneath the hood, for she knew how much of the comfort and peace of the twelve would depend on this lady. She felt exceedingly nervous when the lady, immediately upon shaking hands, asked if she could speak to her alone. "_Natürlich,_" said Anna, a vague fear lest Fritz, the coachman, should have insulted her on the way coming over her, though she only knew Fritz as the mildest of men. She led the way into the drawing-room. "Now what is she going to tell me dreadful?" she thought, as she invited her to sit on the sofa, having been instructed by Trudi that that was the place where strangers expected to sit. "Suppose she isn't going to stay, and I shall have to look for someone all over again? Perhaps the lining of the carriage has been too much for her. _Bitte_" she said aloud, with an uneasy smile, motioning Frau von Penheim towards the sofa. The new companion was a big, elderly lady with a sensible face. Her boots were thick, and she wore a mackintosh. She sat down, and looking more attentively at Anna, smiled. Most people who saw her for the first time did that. It was such a change and a pleasure after seeing plain faces, and dull faces, and vain, pretty faces for an indefinite period, to rest one's eyes on a person so charming yet manifestly preoccupied by other matters than her charms. "I feel it my duty," said the lady in German, "before we go any further to tell you the truth."