But the gratitude of the beautiful companion has always the same restraint in its acknowledgment of kindness; the smile of the beautiful companion has always the same underlying sadness when it responds to Lady Janet's hearty laugh.

Is there something wrong here, under the surface?
Is she suffering in mind, or suffering in body?
What is the matter with her?
The matter with her is secret remorse.

This delicate and beautiful creature pines under the slow torment of constant self-reproach.
To the mistress of the house, and to all who inhabit it or enter it, she is known as Grace Roseberry, the orphan relative by marriage of Lady Janet Roy.

To herself alone she is known as the outcast of the London streets; the inmate of the London Refuge; the lost woman who has stolen her way back--after vainly trying to fight her way back--to Home and Name.

There she sits in the grim shadow of her own terrible secret, disguised in another person's identity, and established in another person's place.