The ladies’ reading-room was a very good place for such work as Esther Denison’s. The quiet was unbroken, because of the thick walls and the retired situation of the great house between the courtyard and the gardens at the back. All the corridors were lined with books,—such books as no one ever asks to read—old calf and leather-bound volumes, which were never taken from their shelves. Those Transactions of Parliament had been there when the Beloved was young and in love, when he went to and fro between this house and the House of Commons in College Green. The deep walls of books seemed to deaden all rumour of life in the ladies’ reading-room, while downstairs the men’s reading-room was crowded, and the swing-doors went from morn till even. Esther Denison used to forget that there was any presence in the room but her own while she worked. The work absorbed her: she delighted in it, difficult as it was. Hour after hour she would sit there, her delicate Muse-like head bent over the abstruse page. Her face was as soft in colour, as delicately and firmly moulded, as a pink sweet-pea. She wore her fair hair plaited, and twisted like a laurel-wreath around her small head. She never looked round, nor glanced up, when the librarian came in noiselessly. He went away carrying with him an impression of the pure profile, the softly opening lips, the head filleted with pale gold, which drew him to return against his will. Little by little something of intimacy sprang up between Esther Denison and Miss Brooke. At first the girl had sent the elder woman a pitying glance and thought. She was half crazed or whole crazed, poor thing. She talked in her sleep, and she was often asleep. When she woke up, she talked to herself or to the picture above the fireplace. Some girls might have been afraid of this strange companion. Not so Esther Denison. She had become accustomed to the odd figure sitting in the chair in front of the fire. She would have missed it if it had not been there. One very grey, very dull afternoon, the fire sank low in the grate while Miss Brooke slept. Esther realised with a start that the room was cold. She had opened a window and the damp chill had entered. It was nearly time for the lights. She stood up and went to replenish the fire, putting on the coal gently, bit by bit, so as not to disturb the sleeper.