CHAPTER XXXIV.
THE HEIRESS’S TRIAL.
ROSE’S letter to Cosmo had been conceived in a sudden commotion of feeling, in which her instincts and sensations had come uppermost, and got almost out of her own control. That savage sense of property which exists in unreasoning childhood had risen to flame and fire within her, mingled with and made still more furious by the terror and panic of possible loss. Beneath all her gentleness and smoothness, and the many glosses of civilisation that clothed her being, Rose had an entirely primitive nature, tenacious of every personal belonging, full of natural acquisitiveness and a love of having, which children and savages share with many highly cultivated persons. She was one of those who, without any conscious evil meaning, are rendered desperate by the idea of personal loss. Her first impulse, when she knew that her ‘rights’ were in danger, was to fight for them wildly, to turn upon all assailants with impassioned fury. She did not want to hurt anyone, but what she had got she meant to keep. The idea of losing the position to which she had been elevated, and the fortune which had made her for the last year so much more important a person than before, filled her with a kind of cruel panic or fierce terror which was ready to seize at any instrument by which its enemies could be confounded. This fierce passion of fear is apt to do more mischief than deliberate cruelty. It will launch any thunderbolt that comes to hand, arrest the very motion of the earth, if possible, and upset the whole course of mortal living. It is more unscrupulous than any tyrant. Rose was altogether possessed by this ferocious terror. When she saw her property and importance threatened, she looked about her wildly to see what machinery she could set in motion for the confusion of her enemies and her own defence. The character of it, and the result of it to others, seemed entirely unimportant to her if only it could stop the danger, forestall the approaching crisis. In the letter which she had surreptitiously read it was stipulated that in a certain case her inheritance was to be absolutely secure, and it had immediately become all-important to Rose to bring about the forbidden thing against which her father had made so violent a stand. She took her measures instantly, with the cunning of ignorance and simplicity and the cruel directness of a childish mind. That there was some difficulty between her sister and Cosmo her quick observation had early divined. Perhaps her vanity had whispered that it was because he liked her best: but, on the other hand, Rose understood the power of pecuniary obstacles, and could feel the want of money in a much more reasonable way than her sister, though so much her superior, ever had done. And in either case her appeal to Cosmo would be sovereign, she thought, in the first heat of her panic. If he had liked her best, he would perceive that it was hopeless. If he had been afraid, because of the want of fortune, her letter would reassure him. And if she could but bring it about—make Anne unpardonable—secure her own ‘rights’!—with a passion of hostility against everybody who could injure her, this was what Rose thought.
But when the letter was fairly gone, and the machinery set in motion, a little chill crept over that first energy of passionate self-defence. Other thoughts began to steal in. The strength of the savage and of the child lies in their singleness of vision. As long as you can perceive only what you want and how it is to be had, or tried for, everything is possible; but when a cold breath steals upon you from here and there, suggesting perhaps the hurt of another whom you have really no desire to hurt, perhaps the actual wickedness which you have no desire to perpetrate, what chills come upon the heat of action, what creeping doubts even of the first headlong step already taken! Rose had three days to reflect upon what she had done, and those three days were not happy. She disguised her discomposure as much as she could, avoiding the society of her mother and sister. Anne, though she was absorbed in occupations much more important than anything that was likely to be involved in the varying looks of Rose, perceived her little sister’s flightiness and petulance with a grieved consciousness that her position as heiress and principal personage of the family group was, now that they were in their own country and better able to realise what it meant, doing Rose harm; while Mrs. Mountford set it down to the girl’s unreasonable fancy for little Keziah, whose company she seemed to seek on all occasions, and whose confidences and preparations were not the kind of things for a young girl to share.
‘No good ever comes of making intimates of your servants,’ her mother said, disturbed by Rose’s uncertain spirits, her excitedness and agitation. What was there to be agitated about? Once or twice the girl, so wildly stirred in her own limited being, so full of ignorant desperation, boldness, and terror, and at the same time cold creepings of doubt and self-disapproval, came pressing close to her mother’s side, with a kind of dumb overture of confidence. But Mrs. Mountford could not understand that there was anything to tell. If there had been a lover at hand, if Heathcote had shown his former admiration (as she understood it) for Rose, or even if he had been coming daily to visit them, she might have been curious, interested, roused to the possibility that there was a secret to tell. But what could Rose find of a nature to be confidential about in Hunston? The thing was incredible. So Mrs. Mountford had said with a little impatience, ‘Can’t you find a seat, my dear? I want my footstool to myself,’ when the child came to her feet as girls are in the habit of doing. Rose felt herself rejected and pushed aside: and Anne’s serious countenance repulsed her still more completely. It frightened her to think that she had been venturing to interfere in her sister’s affairs. What would Anne say? Her panic when she thought of this was inconceivable. It was not a passion of fright like that with which her own possible loss had filled her, but it was a terror that put wings to her feet, that gave her that impulse of instant flight and self-concealment which is the first thought of terror. Thus the poor little undeveloped nature became the plaything of desperate emotions, while yet all incapable of bearing them, and not understanding what they were. She was capable of doing deadly harm to others on one side, and almost of doing deadly harm to herself on the other, out of her extremity of fear.
Cosmo’s letter, however, was as a dash of cold water in Rose’s face. Its momentary effect was one of relief. He would not do what she wanted, therefore he never, never was likely to betray to Anne that she had interfered, and at the same time his refusal eased her sense of wrong-doing: but after the first momentary relief other sensations much less agreeable came into her mind. Her property! her property! Thus she stood, a prey to all the uncertainties—nay, more than this, almost sure that there was no uncertainty, that danger was over for Anne, that she herself was the victim, the deceived one, cruelly betrayed and deserted by her father, who had raised her so high only to abase her the lower—and even by Anne, who had—what had Anne done? Was it certain, Rose asked herself, that Anne had not herself privately read that fatal letter, and acted upon it, though she had pretended to be so much shocked when Rose touched it? That must have been at the bottom of it all. Yes, no doubt that was how it was; most likely it was all a plot—a conspiracy! Anne knew; and had put Cosmo aside—ordered him, perhaps, to pretend to like Rose best!—bound him to wait till the three years were over, and Rose despoiled, and all secure, when the whole thing would come on again, and they would marry, and cheat poor papa in his grave, and rob Rose of her fortune! She became wild with passion as this gradually rose upon her as the thing most likely—nay, more than likely, certain! Only this could have warranted the tone in which Cosmo wrote. His letter was dreadful: it was unkind, it was mocking, it was insolent. Yes! that was the word—insolent! insulting! was what it was. Why, he pretended to propose to her!—to her! Rose! after being engaged to her sister! When Rose read it over again and perceived what even her somewhat obtuse faculties could not miss—the contemptuous mockery of Cosmo’s letter, she stamped her feet with rage and despite. Her passion was too much for her. She clenched her hands tight, and cried for anger, her cheeks flaming, her little feet stamping in fury. And this was the sight which Keziah saw when she came into the room—a sight very alarming to that poor little woman; and, indeed, dangerous in the state of health in which she was.
‘Oh! Miss Rose! Miss Rose!’ she said, with a violent start (which was so bad for her); ‘what is it? what is the matter?’
Rose was in some degree brought to herself by the appearance of a spectator; and, at the same time, it was a comfort to relieve her burdened soul by speaking to someone.
‘Keziah,’ she said, in a great flush of agitation and resentment, ‘it is—it is a gentleman that has been uncivil to me!’
‘Oh, Miss Rose!’ old Saymore’s wife cried out with excitement, attaching a much more practical meaning to the words than Rose had any insight into. ‘Oh, Miss Rose! in our house! Who is it? who is it? Only tell me, and Mr. Saymore will turn him out of doors if it was the best customer we have!’
This rapid acceptance of her complaint, and swift determination to avenge it, brought Rose still more thoroughly to herself.
‘Oh, it is not anyone here. It is a gentleman on—a letter,’ Rose said; and this subdued her. ‘It is not anything Saymore can help me about, nor you, nor anyone.’
‘We are only poor folks, Miss Rose,’ said Keziah, ‘but for a real interest, and wishing you well, there’s none, if it was the Queen herself——’
The ludicrousness of the comparison struck Rose, but struck her not mirthfully—dolefully.
‘It is not much that the Queen can care,’ she said. ‘Anne was presented, but I was never presented. Nobody cares! What was I when Anne was there? Always the little one—the one that was nobody!’
‘But, Miss Rose! Miss Rose!’
Keziah did not know how to put the consolation she wished to give, for indeed she, like everybody else, had mourned the injustice to Anne, which she must condone and accept if she adopted the first suggestion of her sympathy.
‘You know,’ she said, with a little gasp over the renegade nature of the speech—‘you know that Miss Anne is nobody now, and you are the one that everybody thinks of——’
Keziah drew her breath hard after this, and stopped short, more ashamed of her own turncoat utterance than could have been supposed: for indeed, she said to herself, with very conciliatory speciousness of reasoning, though Miss Anne was the one that everybody thought of, she herself had always thought most of Miss Rose, who was not a bit proud, but always ready to talk and tell you anything, and had liked her best.
‘Ah!’ cried Rose, shaking her head, ‘if that were always to last!’ and then she stopped herself suddenly, and looked at Keziah as if there was something to tell, as if considering whether she should tell something. But Rose was not without prudence, and she was able to restrain herself.
‘It does not matter—it does not matter, Keziah,’ she cried, with that air of injured superiority which is always so congenial to youth. ‘There are some people who never get justice, whatever they may do.’
Little Mrs. Saymore was more bewildered than words could say. If there was a fortunate person in the world, was it not Miss Rose? So suddenly enriched, chosen, instead of Miss Anne, to have Miss Anne’s fortune, and all the world at her feet! Keziah did not know what to make of it. But Rose, who had no foolish consideration for other people’s feelings, left her little time for consideration.
‘You may go now,’ she said, with a little wave of her hand; ‘I don’t want anything. I want only to be left alone.’
‘I am sure, Miss Rose,’ said Keziah, offended, ‘I didn’t mean to intrude upon you. I wanted to say as all the things has come home, and if you would like to look at them, I’ve laid them all out in the best room, and they do look sweet,’ said the little, expectant mother.
Rose had taken a great deal of interest in the things, and even had aided in various small pieces of needlework—a condescension which Mrs. Mountford did not approve. But to-day she was in no mood for this inspection. She shook her head and waved her hand with a mixture of majesty and despondency.
‘Not to-day. I have other things to think of, Keziah. I couldn’t look at them to-day.’
This made Keziah take an abrupt leave, with offence which swallowed up her sympathy. Afterwards sympathy had the better of her resentment. She went and reviewed her little show by herself, and felt sorry for Miss Rose. It must be a trouble indeed which could not be consoled by a sight of the things, with all their little frills goffered, and little laces so neatly ironed, laid out in sets upon the best bed.
When, however, Keziah had withdrawn, the want of anyone to speak to became intolerable to Rose. She was not used to be shut up within the limits of her own small being; and though she could keep her little secrets as well as anyone, yet the possession of this big secret, now that there was no longer anything to do—now that her initiative had failed, and produced her nothing but Cosmo’s insolent letter, with its mock proposal—was more than she could contain. She dared not speak to Anne, and her mother had unwittingly repulsed her confidence. A tingling impatience took possession of her. If Keziah had been present—little as Keziah would have understood it, and unsuitable as she would have been for a confidante—Rose felt that she must have told her all. But even Keziah was not within her reach. She tried to settle to something, to read, to do some of her fancy-work. For a moment she thought that to ‘practise’—a duty which in her emancipation she had much neglected—might soothe her; but she could only practise by going to the sitting-room where the piano was, where her mother usually sat, and where Anne most likely would be at that hour. Her book was a novel, but she could not read it. Even novels, though they are a wonderful resource in the vigils of life, lose their interest at the moments when the reader’s own story is at, or approaching, a crisis. When she sat down to read, one of the phrases in Cosmo’s letter would suddenly dart upon her mind like a winged insect and give her a sting: or the more serious words of the other letter—the secret of the dead which she had violated—would flit across her, till her brain could stand it no longer. She rose up with a start and fling, in a kind of childish desperation. She could not, would not bear it! all alone in that little dark cell of herself, with no rays of light penetrating it except the most unconsolatory rays, which were not light at all, but spurts as of evil gases, and bad little savage suggestions, such as to make another raid upon Anne’s despatch-box, and get the letter again and burn it, and make an end of it coming into her mind against her will. But then, even if she were so wicked as to do that, how did she know there was not another? indeed, Rose was almost sure that Anne had told her there was another—the result of which would be that she would only have the excitement of doing something very wrong without getting any good from it. She sat with her book in her hand, and went over a page or two without understanding a word. And then she jumped up and stamped her little feet and clenched her hands, and made faces in the glass at Cosmo and fate. Then, in utter impatience, feeling herself like a hunted creature, pursued by something, she knew not what, Rose seized her hat and went out, stealing softly down the stairs that nobody might see her. She said to herself that there was a bit of ribbon to buy. There are always bits of ribbon to buy for a young lady’s toilette. She would save the maid the trouble and get it for herself.
The tranquil little old-fashioned High Street of a country town on an August morning is as tranquillising a place as it is possible to imagine. It was more quiet, more retired, and what Rose called dull, than the open fields. All the irregular roofs—here a high-peaked gable, there an overhanging upper story, the red pediment of the Queen Anne house which was Mr. Loseby’s office and dwelling, the clustered chimneys of the almshouses—how they stood out upon the serene blueness of the sky and brilliancy of the sunshine! And underneath how shady it was! how cool on the shady side! in what a depth of soft shelter, contrasting with the blaze on the opposite pavement, was the deep cavernous doorway of the ‘Black Bull,’ and the show in the shop windows, where one mild wayfarer in muslin was gazing in, making the quiet more apparent! A boy in blue, with a butcher’s tray upon his head, was crossing the street; two little children in sunbonnets were going along with a basket between them; and in the extreme distance was a costermonger’s cart with fruit and vegetables, which had drawn some women to their doors. Of itself the cry of the man who was selling these provisions was not melodious, but it was so softened by the delight of the still, sweet, morning air, in which there was still a whiff of dew, that it toned down into the general harmony, adding a not unpleasant sense of common affairs, the leisurely bargain, the innocent acquisition, the daily necessary traffic which keeps homes and tables supplied. The buying and selling of the rosy-cheeked apples and green cabbages belonged to the quiet ease of living in such a softened, silent place. Rose did not enter into the sentiment of the scene; she was herself a discord in it. In noisy London she would have been more at home; and yet the quiet soothed her, though she interrupted and broke it up with the sharp pat of her high-heeled boot and the crackle of her French muslin. She was not disposed towards the limp untidy draperies that are ‘the fashion.’ Her dress neither swept the pavement nor was huddled up about her knees like the curtains of a shabby room, but billowed about her in crisp puffs, with enough of starch; and her footstep, which was never languid, struck the pavement more sharply than ever in the energy of her discomposure. The butcher in the vacant open shop, from which fortunately most of its contents had been removed, came out to the door bewildered to see who it could be; and one of Mr. Loseby’s clerks poked out of a window in his shirt-sleeves, but drew back again much confused and abashed when he caught the young lady’s eye. The clerks in Mr. Loseby’s office were not, it may be supposed, of an order to hope from any notice from a Miss Mountford of Mount; yet in the twenties both boys and girls have their delusions on that point. Rose, however, noticed the young clerk no more than if he had been a costermonger, or one of the cabbages that worthy was selling; yet the sight of him gave her a new idea. Mr. Loseby! any Mountford of Mount had a right to speak to Mr. Loseby, whatever trouble he or she might be in. And Rose knew the way into his private room as well as if she had been a child of the house. She obeyed her sudden impulse, with a great many calculations equally sudden springing up spontaneously in her bosom. It would be well to see what Mr. Loseby knew; and then he might be able to think of some way of punishing Cosmo: and then—in any case it would be a relief to her mind. The young clerk in his shirt-sleeves, yawning over his desk, heard the pat of her high heels coming up the steps at the door, and could not believe his ears. He addressed himself to his work with an earnestness which was almost solemn. Was she coming to complain of his stare at her from the window? or was it to ask Mr. Loseby, perhaps, who was that nice-looking young man in the little room close to the door?
Mr. Loseby’s room was apt to look dusty in the summer, though it was in fact kept in admirable order. But the Turkey carpet was very old, and penetrated by the sweeping of generations, and the fireplace always had a tinge of ashes about it. To-day the windows were open, the Venetian blinds down, and there was a sort of green dimness in the room, in which Rose, dazzled by the sunshine out of doors, could for the moment distinguish nothing. She was startled by Mr. Loseby’s exclamation of her name. She thought for the moment that he had found her out internally as well as externally, and surprised her secret as well as herself. ‘Why, little Rose!’ he said. He was sitting in a coat made of yellow Indian grass-silk which did not accord so well as his usual shining blackness with the glistening of his little round bald head, and his eyes and spectacles. His table was covered with papers done up in bundles with all kinds of red tape and bands. ‘This is a sight for sore eyes,’ he said. ‘You are like summer itself stepping into an old man’s dusty den; come and sit near me and let me look at you, my summer Rose! I don’t know which is the freshest and the prettiest!’ said the old lawyer, waving his hand towards a beautiful luxurious blossom of ‘La France’ which was on his table in a Venetian glass. He had a fancy for pretty things.
‘Oh, I was passing, and I thought I would come in—and see you,’ Rose said.
Mr. Loseby had taken her appearance very quietly, as a matter of course; but when she began to explain he was startled. He pushed his spectacles up upon his forehead and looked at her curiously. ‘Ah!’ he said, ‘that was kind of you—to come with no other object than to see an old man.’
‘Oh!’ cried Rose, confused, ‘I did not say I had no other object, Mr. Loseby. I want you to tell me—is—is—Anne likely to settle upon the Dower-house? I do so want to know.’
‘My dear child, your mother has as much to do with it as Anne has. You will hear from her better than from me.’
‘To be sure, that is true,’ said Rose; and then, after a pause, ‘Oh, Mr. Loseby, is it really, really true that Cosmo Douglas is not going to marry Anne? isn’t it shameful? to bring her into such trouble and then to forsake her. Couldn’t he be made to marry her? I think it is a horrid shame that a man should behave like that and get no punishment at all.’
Mr. Loseby pushed his spectacles higher and higher; he peered at her through the partial light with a very close scrutiny. Then he rose and half drew up one of the blinds. But even this did not satisfy him. ‘Do you think then,’ he said at last, ‘that it would be a punishment to a man to marry Anne?’
‘It would depend upon what his feelings were,’ said Rose with much force of reason; ‘if he wanted, for example, to marry—somebody else.’
‘Say Rose—instead of Anne,’ said the acute old lawyer, with a grin which was very much like a grimace.
‘I am sure I never said that!’ cried Rose. ‘I never, never said it, nor so much as hinted at it. He may say what he pleases, but I never, never said it! you always thought the worst of me, Mr. Loseby, Anne was always your favourite; but you need not be unjust. Haven’t I come here expressly to ask you? Couldn’t he be made to marry her? Why, they were engaged! everybody has talked of them as engaged. And if it is broken off, think how awkward for Anne.’
Mr. Loseby took off his spectacles, which had been twinkling and glittering upon his forehead like a second pair of eyes—this was a very strong step, denoting unusual excitement—and wiped them deliberately while he looked at Rose. He had the idea, which was not a just idea, that either Rose had been exercising her fascinations upon her sister’s lover, or that she had been in her turn fascinated by him. ‘You saw a good deal of Mr. Douglas in town?’ he said, looking at her keenly, always polishing his spectacles; but Rose sustained the gaze without shrinking.
‘Oh, a great deal,’ she said; ‘he went everywhere with us. He was very nice to mamma and me. Still I do not care a bit about him if he behaves badly to Anne; but he ought not to be let off—he ought to be made to marry her. I told him—what I was quite ready to do——’
‘And what are you quite ready to do, if one might know?’ Mr. Loseby was savage. His grin at her was full of malice and all uncharitableness.
‘Oh, you know very well!’ cried Rose, ‘it was you first who said—— Will you tell me one thing, Mr. Loseby,’ she ran on, her countenance changing; ‘what does it mean by the will of 1868?’
‘What does what mean?’ The old lawyer was roused instantly. It was not that he divined anything, but his quick instinct forestalled suspicion, and there suddenly gleamed over him a consciousness that there was something to divine.
‘Oh!—I mean,’ said Rose, correcting herself quickly, ‘what is meant by the will of 1868? I think I ought to know.’
Mr. Loseby eyed her more and more closely. ‘I wonder,’ he said, ‘how you know that there was a will of 1868?’
But there was nothing in his aspect to put Rose on her guard. ‘I think I ought to know,’ she said, ‘but I am always treated like a child. And if things were to turn round again, and everything to go back, and me never to have any good of it, I wonder what would be the use at all of having made any change?’
Mr. Loseby put on his spectacles again. He wore a still more familiar aspect when he had his two spare eyes pushed up from his forehead, ready for use at a moment’s notice. He was on the verge of a discovery, but he did not know as yet what that discovery would be.
‘That is very true,’ he said; ‘and it shows a great deal of sense on your part: for if everything were to turn round it would certainly be no use at all to have made any change. The will of 1868 is the will that was made directly after your father married for the second time; it was made to secure her mother’s fortune to your sister Anne.’
‘Without even the least thought of me!’ cried Rose, indignant.
‘It was before you were born,’ said Mr. Loseby, with a laugh that exasperated her.
‘Oh!’ she cried, with an access of that fury which had frightened Keziah, ‘how horrible people are! how unkind things are! how odious it is to be set up and set down and never know what you are, or what is going to happen! Did I do anything to Cosmo Douglas to make him break off with Anne? is it my fault that he is not going to marry her after all? and yet it will be me that will suffer, and nobody else at all. Mr. Loseby, can’t it be put a stop to? I know you like Anne best, but why should not I have justice, though I am not Anne? Oh, it is too bad! it is cruel—it is wicked! Only just because papa was cross and out of temper, and another man is changeable, why should I be the one to suffer? Mr. Loseby, I am sure if you were to try you could change it; you could stop us from going back to this will of 1868 that was made before I was born. If it was only to burn that bit of paper, that horrid letter, that thing! I had nearly put it into the fire myself. Oh!’ Rose wound up with a little cry: she came suddenly to herself out of her passion and indignation, and shrank away, as it were, into a corner, and confronted the old lawyer with a pale and troubled countenance like a child found out. What had she done? She had betrayed herself. She looked at him alarmed, abashed, in a sudden panic which was cold, not hot with passion, like her previous one. What could he cause to be done to her? What commotion and exposure might he make? She scarcely dared to lift her eyes to his face; but yet would not lose sight of him lest something might escape her which he should do.
‘Rose,’ he said, with a tone of great severity, yet a sort of chuckle behind it which gave her consolation, ‘you have got hold of your father’s letter to Anne.’
‘Well,’ she said, trembling but defiant, ‘it had to be read some time, Mr. Loseby. It was only about us two; why should we wait so many years to know what was in it? A letter from papa! Of course we wanted to know what it said.’
‘We! Does Anne know too?’ he cried, horrified. And it gleamed across Rose’s mind for one moment that to join Anne with herself would be to diminish her own criminality. But after a moment she relinquished this idea, which was not tenable. ‘Oh, please!’ she cried, ‘don’t let Anne know! She would not let me touch it. But why shouldn’t we touch it? It was not a stranger that wrote it—it was our own father. Of course I wanted to know what he said.’
There was a ludicrous struggle on Mr. Loseby’s face. He wanted to be severe, and he wanted to laugh. He was disgusted with Rose, yet very lenient to the little pretty child he had known all his life, and his heart was dancing with satisfaction at the good news thus betrayed to him. ‘I have got a duplicate of it in my drawer, and it may not be of much use when all is said. Since you have broken your father’s confidence, and violated his last wishes, and laid yourself open to all sorts of penalties, you—may as well tell me all about it,’ he said.
When Rose emerged into the street after this interview, she came down the steps straight upon Willie Ashley, who was mooning by, not looking whither he was going, and in a somewhat disconsolate mood. He had been calling upon Mrs. Mountford, but Rose had not been visible. Willie knew it was ‘no use’ making a fool of himself, as he said, about Rose; but yet when he was within reach he could not keep his feet from wandering where she was. When he thus came in her way accidentally, his glum countenance lighted up into a blaze of pleasure. ‘Oh, here you are!’ he cried in a delighted voice. ‘I’ve been to Saymore’s and seen your mother, but you were not in.’ This narrative of so self-evident a fact made Rose laugh, though there were tears of agitation and trouble on her face, which made Willie conclude that old Loseby (confound him!) had been scolding her for something. But when Rose laughed all was well.
‘Of course I was not in. It is so tiresome there—nothing to do, nowhere to go. I can’t think why Anne wishes to keep us here of all places in the world.’
‘But you are coming to the Dower-house at Lilford? Oh! say you are coming, Rose. I know some people that would dance for joy.’
‘What people? I don’t believe anybody cares where we live,’ said Rose with demure consciousness, walking along by his side with her eyes cast down, but a smile hovering about the corners of her mouth. Confession had been of use to her, and had relieved her soul, even though Mr. Loseby had no power to confer absolution.