She had dismissed Eunice, and sat before the fire in a loose, white dressing-gown, her lovely hair falling around her, her deep, earnest eyes fixed on the red blaze.

What should she do?
Accept Sir Ronald Keith's offer, and achieve a brilliant place in the world, or sink into insignificance in this remote corner of the earth?
It was all true what he had said: in a few days her father would be married.

Another would be mistress where she had reigned--another, who might look upon her as an incumbrance and a burden.

She had been content to remain here while she held the first place in her father's heart; but another held that place now, and would hold it forever.

What should she do in the long days, and months, and years, that were to come?
How should she drag through a useless and monotonous existence in this dull place?
Even now, earnestly as she sought to do good in her mission of mercy, there were hours and hours of wretched, unspeakable dreariness and desolation.