So that for once Alice Puttenham was free to think and feel for her own life and what concerned it. From the events connected with Judith Sabin's death--through the long history of Meynell's goodness to her--the mind of this lonely woman travelled on, to be filled and arrested by the great new fact of the present. She had made a new friend. And at the same moment she had found in her--at last--the rival with whom her own knowledge of life had threatened her these many years. A rival so sweet--so unwitting! Alice had read her. She had scarcely yet read herself. Alice opened her eyes--to the quiet room, and the windy sky outside. She was very pale, but there were no tears. "It is not renouncing"--she whispered to herself--"for I never possessed. It is accepting--loving--giving--all one has to give." And vaguely there ran through her mind immortal words--"_good measure--pressed down, and running over_." A smile trembled on her lip. She closed her eyes again, lost in one of those spiritual passions accessible only to those who know the play and heat of the spiritual war. The wind was blowing briskly outside, and from the wood-shed in the back garden came a sound of sawing. Miss Puttenham did not hear a footstep approaching on the grass outside. * * * * * Hester paused at the window--smiling. There was wildness--triumph--in her look, as though for her this quiet afternoon had seen some undisclosed adventure. Her cheek was hotly flushed, her loosened hair made a glory in the evening sun. Youth, selfishly pitiless--youth, the supplanter and destroyer--stood embodied in the beautiful creature looking down upon Alice Puttenham, on the still intensity of the plaintive face, the closed eyes, the hands holding the miniature. Mischievously the girl came closer. She took the stillness before her for sleep. "Auntie! Aunt Alsie!" With a start, Alice Puttenham sprang up. The miniature dropped from her hands to the floor, opening as it fell. Hester looked at it astonished--and her hand stooped for it before Miss Puttenham had perceived her loss. "Were you asleep, Aunt Alsie?" she asked, wondering. "I got tired of that stupid party--and I--well, I just slipped away"--the clear high voice had grown conscious--"and I looked in here, because I left a book behind me--Auntie, who is it?" She bent eagerly over the miniature, trying to see it in the dim light. Miss Puttenham's face had faded to a gray-white. "Give it to me, Hester!" She held out her hand imperiously. "Mayn't I know even who it is?" asked Hester, as she unwillingly returned it. In the act she caught the inscription and her face kindled. Impetuously throwing herself down beside Miss Puttenham, the girl looked up at her with an expression half mockery, half sweetness, while Alice, with unsteady fingers, replaced the case and locked the drawer.