Wyndham has worked himself into quite a righteous fever of wrath against her. Good heavens! what a row there is bound to be shortly with his aunt about this obstinate recluse! He has gone a little too far. The girl turns upon him, gently indeed, but with a certain dignity in her air. ‘As I have told you, I can always leave this,’ says she; ‘but it will be for a place where I can live alone, and where I shall never have to leave my home, even though it be a garret. I—I have thought of a convent’—her voice faltering—‘but I am a Protestant, and—’ She sighs heavily. ‘Mr. Wyndham,’ cries she suddenly, ‘why do you want me to go out—to know people? Why?’ Wyndham, who could have given one very excellent reason for his wish, remains determinedly silent. ‘You see,’ cries she triumphantly, ‘you have no reason at all, and I am ever so much happier by myself! I don’t say but that, if I were somebody else, I should not like to go into that garden there’—pointing towards the Rectory—‘but as it is, it would frighten me to step outside the gate.’ ‘And how long is this state of things to go on?’ asks Wyndham—‘until you are ninety?’ ‘Ah, he can’t live till then,’ says she; ‘and, besides, long before that I shall be old and ugly, and he won’t care. You know’—growing crimson—‘what I told you.’ ‘Yes.’ Wyndham frowns. ‘You told me enough to know he was a most infernal scoundrel.’ ‘I suppose he is that,’ says she thoughtfully. ‘Though I don’t think really he would ever murder anybody. You see, he didn’t even murder me. He only wanted to marry me! That was what made me so angry. If he had made me marry him’—turning to Wyndham with a quick, sharp movement—‘you think that would mean that I should have to live with him always?’ She pauses as if eager for an answer, and when he does not speak, she says imperatively: ‘Well?’ Wyndham nods his head. ‘It wouldn’t, however,’ says she with angry emphasis. ‘I’d have run away after I was married, just the same. Only I thought it better to do it before.’ There is so much force, so much girlish venom, in her tone, that Wyndham feels inclined to laugh; but the little air mutin she has taken sits so curiously, and with such an unexpected charm, upon her, that somehow his laughter dies within him. Something about her now, too, as she stands there flushed and defiant, strikes him as familiar. Who is she like? ‘For a young lady so very valiant, I wonder you are so afraid to face the world,’ says he gravely. ‘Ah, I am not afraid of the world, but of him!’ says she. ‘And’—she draws closer to him, and now all her bravery has died away from her, and she looks as greatly in want of courage as a mouse—‘I’m afraid of this new lady, too! Is she—kind—nice? will she—be angry with me sometimes?’ ‘Very likely,’ says Wyndham. He softens this disagreeable answer, however, by a smile. ‘No—you must not be afraid of her. She is an old friend of mine, and very charming. And she is quite prepared to love you.’ ‘Ah! Then you have said—’