More forcibly than ever on this evening, when she sat in the spacious drawing-room surrounded by its many elegancies, did the contrast between the Red Court and her own poor home of the past strike on the senses of Anna Chester. Nothing that moderate wealth could purchase was _here_ wanting. Several servants, spacious and handsome rooms, luxuries to please the eye and please the palate. Look at the tea-table laid out there! The delicately-made Worcester china, rich in hues of purple and gold; the chased silver tea and coffee service on their chased silver stands; small fringed damask napkins on the purple and gold plates. Shrimps large as prawns, potted meats, rolled bread-and-butter, muffins, rich cake, and marmalade, are there; for it is Justice Thornycroft's will that all meals, if laid, shall be laid well. Sometimes a cup of tea only came in for Miss Thornycroft, as it used to do for my lady when she was there. It almost seemed to Anna Chester as if she were enacting a deceit, a lie, in sitting at it, its honoured guest, for whom these things were spread, when she thought of the scrambling meals in her former home with Mrs. Chester's children. The odd teacups--for as one got broken it would be-replaced by another of any shape or pattern, provided it were cheap; saucers notched; cracked cups without handles; the stale loaf on the table; the scanty, untidy plate of salt butter, of which she had to cut perpetual slices, like Werther's Charlotte; the stained table without a cover, crumbs strewing it. Look on this picture and on that. Anna did, in deep dejection; and the thought which had faintly presented itself to her mind when Isaac Thornycroft spoke his momentous words, grew into grim and defined shape, and would not be scared away--that she could be no fit wife for Isaac. She resolved to tell him of these things, and of her own unfitness; how very poor she was, always had been, always (according to present prospects) would be; and beg him to think no more of her; and she did not doubt he would unsay his words of his own accord when he came to know of it. It is true she winced at the task: but her conscience told her it must be done, though her heart should faint at it. She could imagine no fate so bright in the wide world as that of becoming the wife of Isaac Thornycroft. "What makes you so silent this evening?" Anna started at Miss Thornycroft's words. That young lady was eyeing her with curiosity. "I was only thinking," she answered, with a vivid blush. "Oh, and I forgot: your brother wished me to ask you not to wait tea for him." "My brother! Which of them?" "Mr. Isaac." "Very considerate, I'm sure! seeing that I never do wait, and that if I did he would probably not come in." There was a mocking tone in her voice that Anna rather winced at as applied to Isaac. She went on explaining where she saw him; that he and Richard had walked away together--she fancied to Tomlett's.