She held me by the hands after the first salutation, and looked at my mourning dress and my pale cheeks, and said, "poor dear!" She was herself very gay in an ample matronly finery, with satin skirts, and a great rich shawl, with a width and a warmth in her embrace, and a soft faint perfume about her which were quite new to me. Her fingers were soft, large, and pink and delicate; her touch was a positive pleasure. There are some people who make you conscious of your own appearance by the strange contrast which you feel it bears to theirs. Mrs. Ennerdale was one of those; I felt how cloudy, how dull, how unreal it was, living on imaginary rights and wrongs, and throwing my life away, when I felt myself within the warm pressure of these kindly human arms. Mr. Ennerdale was a Squire like other Squires, a hearty comfortable country gentleman, with nothing much to distinguish him from his class--he shook hands with me very warmly, and looked still more closely in my face than his wife had done. "You're a _little_ like your mother, Mrs. Southcote," he said in a disappointed tone, as he let me go. I might have been when I was happy; but I certainly was not now. And then Flora came to me, shyly but frankly--holding my hand with a lingering light clasp, as if she expected a warmer salutation from her new found cousin. She was a year younger than I, very pretty, very fresh and sweet like a half-blown rose. She took her place upon a low chair close by me, and kept her sweet blue eyes on my face when I spoke, and looked at me with great interest and respectfulness. Poor young innocent Flora!--_she_ did not wonder that I looked ill, or question what was the matter with me. She was not skilled, nor could discriminate between unhappiness and grief. It was not jealousy that crossed my mind, nor anything approaching to it. I only could not help fancying to myself how different everything would have been had she been mistress of Cottiswoode--how bright the house--how happy the master. It was a pleasure to look at the innocent sweet face. I admired her as only women can admire each other. I was not shy of looking at her as a man might have been. I had a pure pleasure in the sweet bloom of her cheek, the pretty turn and rounding of its outline. I had a great love of beauty by nature, but I had seen few beautiful people. Many a time the sweet complexion of Alice, and her comely bright face, had charmed me unawares, and I was a great deal more delighted with Flora now.