She was lost, for the instant, in a maze of disagreeable reflection.

She was afraid she now understood only too well why Ida instead of Evelyn Ward had come to see her.

In the Ward family the hard tasks had apparently been thrust upon the patient elder sister, while the younger reaped where she had not sown, without a conscientious qualm.

And it was for this beautiful, selfish girl that she and Emma had curtailed their comfort.

She almost wished she had been firm in her first refusal to consider taking another girl into Harlowe House.