Lady Carse was now very pale. She had once said, and then fully believed it, that she had no shame. It was long since she had felt shame. She felt it now, when it struck her that during all her long reveries about her escape and her restoration to the world, not one thought of her children had entered into the imagery of her dream. Like all people of strong passions, she had taken for granted that there was something grand and fine in the intensity of her feelings. Now, for a moment, the clear mirror of Annie's mind was held up before her own, and she saw herself as she was. For one instant she perceived that she was worthy of her husband's detestation. But she was not one to tolerate painful and humbling ideas long. She recurred to her unequalled wrongs, and was proud and comforted. She walked down to her retreat without looking behind her, leaving Rollo to tether the pony, and help his mother down as he could. When Annie entered the cave, the drops were standing on her face, so great had been the pain to her rheumatic limbs on descending to the shore. "But," said she, as she sank down on the sand by the smouldering fire, "I could not but come, when I heard from Rollo that you were still breathing God's air." "Do you mean that that was good news or bad?" "Oh, good! Surely good news. At first, for a moment after Macdonald told me you were drowned in the night, I felt thankful that your troubles were over. But I soon saw it the right way; and when Rollo whispered you were--" "What do you mean by seeing it the right way? How do you know that your first feeling was not the right one? I am sure it was the kindest to me. You think yourself religious, and so you ought to be glad when an unhappy person is `where the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary are at rest.'" Annie did not reply. She was looking at the fire, and by its light it might be seen that tears were gathering in her eyes. "Ah!" said the irritable lady, "you, and such as you, who think you abide in the Scriptures so that nothing can move you; what becomes of you when you are answered by Scripture?" "I do not feel myself answered," Annie quietly replied. "Oh, indeed!" "I feel what you said out of Scripture to be quite true; and that it is a great blessing that God has set the quiet grave before our eyes for such as can find no other rest. But I would not forget that there is another and a better rest, without waiting for the grave." "You are so narrow, Annie! You judge of everybody by yourself!" "That is a great danger I know," Annie agreed. "And I cannot speak from my own knowledge of being troubled by the wicked. But I have read and heard much of good men who were buffeted by the wicked for the best part of their lives, and at last got over being troubled by it, and more than that." "Ah! gloried in it, no doubt. Everyone is proud of something; and they were proud of that."