It gave me force enough to carry out my defiance a little longer.

Before the door could be opened I sprang to my feet, and stood erect, and outwardly very calm, gazing through the window, with my face turned away from the persons who were coming in; I was so placed that I could see them reflected in the mirror over the fireplace.

A servant came first, carrying in a tray, upon which were a lamp and my tea--such a meal as might be prepared for a school-girl in disgrace.
She came up to me, as if to draw down the blinds and close the shutters.
"Leave them," I said; "I will do it myself by-and-by." "He's not coming home to-night," said a woman's voice behind me, in a scoffing tone.
I could see her too without turning round.

A handsome woman, with bold black eyes, and a rouged face, which showed coarsely in the ugly looking-glass.

She was extravagantly dressed, and wore a profusion of ornaments--tawdry ones, mostly, but one or two I recognized as my own.
She was not many years older than myself.