had found for her. Molly was hurt for Cynthia at all these speeches; she thought they implied that the pleasure which her mother felt in seeing her a fortnight sooner, after her two years’ absence, was inferior to that which she would have received from a bundle of silver-paper patterns. But Cynthia took no apparent notice of the frequent recurrence of these small complaints. Indeed, she received much of what her mother said with a kind of complete indifference, that made Mrs. Gibson hold her rather in awe; and she was much more communicative to Molly than to her own child. With regard to dress, however, Cynthia soon showed that she was her mother’s own daughter, in the manner in which she could use her deft and nimble fingers. She was a capital workwoman; and, unlike Molly, who excelled in plain-sewing, but had no notion of dress-making or millinery, she could repeat the fashions she had only seen in passing along the streets of Boulogne, with one or two pretty-rapid movements of her hands as she turned and twisted the ribbons and gauze her mother furnished her with. So she refurbished Mrs. Gibson’s wardrobe; doing it all in a sort of contemptuous manner, the source of which Molly could not quite make out.

Day after day, the course of these small frivolities was broken in upon by the news Mr. Gibson brought of Mrs. Hamley’s nearer approach to death. Molly—very often sitting by Cynthia, and surrounded by ribbon, and wire, and net—heard the bulletins, like the toll of a funeral bell at a marriage feast. Her father sympathised with her. It was the loss of a dear friend to him too; but he was so accustomed to death, that it seemed to him but as it was, the natural end of all things human. To Molly, the death of some one she had known so well and loved so much was a sad and gloomy phenomenon. She loathed the small vanities with which she was surrounded, and would wander out into the frosty garden, and pace the walk, which was both sheltered and concealed by evergreens.

At length—and yet it was not so long, not a fortnight since Molly had left the Hall—the end came. Mrs. Hamley had sunk out of life, as gradually as she had sunk out of consciousness and her place in this world. The quiet waves closed over her, and her place knew her no more.

“They all sent their love to you, Molly,” said her father. “Roger said he knew how you would feel it.”

Mr. Gibson had come in very late, and was having a solitary dinner in the dining-room. Molly was sitting near him, to keep him company. Cynthia and her mother were upstairs. The latter was trying on a head- dress which Cynthia had made for her.

Molly remained downstairs, after her father had gone out afresh on his final round among his town- patients. The fire was growing very low, and the lights were waning. Cynthia came softly in, and, taking Molly’s listless hand, that hung down by her side, sat at her feet on the rug, chafing her chilly fingers without speaking. The tender action thawed the tears that had been gathering heavily at Molly’s heart, and they came dropping down her cheeks.

“You loved her dearly, did you not, Molly?”

“Yes,” sobbed Molly; and then there was a silence.

“Had you known her long?”

“No, not a year. But I had seen a great deal of her. I was almost like a daughter to her; she said so. Yet I never bid her good-bye or anything. Her mind became weak and confused.”

“She had only sons, I think?”

“No; only Mr. Osborne and Mr. Roger Hamley. She had a daughter once—Fanny. Sometimes, in her illness, she used to call me ‘Fanny.’ ”

The two girls were silent for some time, both gazing into the fire. Cynthia spoke first—

“I wish I could love people as you do, Molly!”