"I don't know why I should give myself any trouble about her. I will let her wait till she comes to her senses and humbles herself to me." "Do you think she ever will?" "I don't care, whether she does or not. It is all the same to me. You let her alone too, Antoinette." "_I_ will," said Antoinette. "I don't like spitfires. High! what a powder-magazine she is, mamma! Her eyes are enough to set fire to things sometimes." "Don't use such an inelegant word, Antoinette. 'High!' How can you? Where did you get it?" "You send me to school, mamma, to learn; and so I pick up a few things. But do you think it is true, what she says about Mr. Southwode?" "What?" "That he will come and take her away from you." "Not if I don't choose it," "And you will not choose it, will you?" "Don't be foolish, Antoinette. Rotha will never see Mr. Southwode again. She has defied me, and now she may take the consequences." "But he _will_ come back, mamma? He said so." "I hope he will." "Then he'll find Rotha, and she'll tell him her own story." "Will you trust me to look after my own affairs? And get yourself ready to go out with me immediately." CHAPTER XIV. IN SECLUSION. Rotha climbed the three flights of stairs from the breakfast room, feeling that her aunt's house, and the world generally, had become a desert to her. She went up to her own little room, being very sure that neither in the warm dressing room on the second floor, nor indeed in any other, would she be welcome, or even perhaps tolerated. How should she be, after what had taken place? And how could she breathe, anyhow, in any atmosphere where her aunt was? Imprudent? had she been imprudent? Very possibly; she had brought matters to an unmanageable point, inconvenient for all parties; and she had broken through the cold reserve which it had been her purpose to maintain, and lost sight wholly of the principles by which it had Been Mr. Digby's wish that she should be guided. Rotha had a mental recognition of all this; but passion met it with simple defiance. She was not weeping; the fire at her heart scorched all tender moisture, though it would not keep her blood warm. The day was wintry indeed. Rotha pulled the coverlet off her bed and wrapped herself in it, and sat down to think. .