That day was a dull one. I did not feel at home, and could not make myself feel so. Madame de Mellissie went out in the carriage with Lady Chandos, and I was alone. I strolled out a little in the afternoon, just to see what the place outside was like. The gates of egress were on the left, the gravel drive leading straight to them; but there were so many paths and walks, and trees and rocks, and banks and flower-beds on either side, that you might almost lose yourself, and quite lose sight of the broad drive. The most curious-looking feature about Chandos was the little upper turret: but for the narrow Gothic window in it, it might have been taken for a pigeon-house.

I came back, and crossed to the Pine Walk; that again was intersected by paths, conducting it was hard to say whither. The trees were towering aloft, the lower shrubs were high and thick. In three minutes after quitting the house, not a vestige even of its chimneys was to be seen; and I retraced my steps, not caring to lose myself. But for the beautiful order in which everything was kept, the place might have been called a wilderness.

I noticed one thing: that the front windows in each of the wings had their inside shutters closed; strong oak shutters: both the lower and the upper rooms were shut in from the light of day. I never saw them opened while I stayed at Chandos. The lower windows, looking to the sides of the house, were also kept dark; but the rooms above and those looking to the back were open. A narrow gravel path, shut in by laurels, led round the wings to the back of the house. The servants used that by the east wing, the one inhabited by Mrs. Chandos. No one used the other, except Lady Chandos. For a servant or any one else to be seen there would have been high treason, involving probably dismissal. It was an understood law of the house, and never rebelled against. The shrubs on Lady Chandos\'s side had grown thick as a very grove, affording just space for one person to pass to the small door that gave entrance to the wing. I knew nothing of the prohibition in strolling there that day. On learning it afterwards, I felt thankful not to have been seen.

I was indoors, and sitting in my bed-chamber, the chintz room, when the carriage returned. Emily, in high spirits, saw me as she ran upstairs, and came in.

"All alone, Anne! We have had a charming drive. To-morrow, if you are good, you shall have one; we\'ll take the large carriage."

She stood with her foot on a small low chair, tilting it about, and looking out at the servants, who were turning the horses to drive round to the stables at the back.

"What a nice place this seems to be, Madame de Mellissie! But I think, if I were Lady Chandos, I should have the trees and shrubs thinned a little."

"It is mamma\'s pleasure that they shall be thick. She only lives in retirement. Were my brother, Sir Thomas, to come home, he might effect a change. As long as he is away, mamma\'s will is paramount at Chandos."

"How many brothers have you?"

"Two. Sir Thomas and Harry."

"Have you lost any?"

"Any brothers? A little one: Greville. He died when he was six years old. Why do you ask?"

"I was only wondering who Mrs. Chandos was. It has been crossing my mind that she is perhaps a daughter-in-law."

Madame de Mellissie turned on me a haughty face of reproof. "It certainly is no affair of yours, Miss Hereford. Mrs. Chandos is Mrs. Chandos; she is no impostor."

"I beg your pardon, madam," I meekly answered, feeling I had deserved it. What right had I, Anne Hereford, to be curious, and to show it?

It effectually silenced me for the rest of the day. We dined together; herself, Lady Chandos, and I. Mrs. Chandos I saw no more of, and Mr. Chandos was dining at Marden, a town some few miles off.

We were at breakfast the following morning, when the letters, as before, were brought in. Two or three for the servants, which Mr. Chandos returned to Hickens, one for Mr. Chandos, and one for Madame Alfred de Mellissie.

"I thought he would be writing," Emily observed, in a tone of apathy, carelessly holding out her hand for the letter. "Though I know he hates it like poison, Frenchman like."

"It is not your husband\'s hand, Emily," said Mr. Chandos.

"No? Why--I declare it is old Madame de Mellissie\'s! What can be amiss?" she cried.

"There! was ever anything like that?" she exclaimed, glancing down the letter. "Alfred\'s taken ill: his fancied gastric fever has turned into a real one. And I must go back without delay, the old mère writes."

"Is he very ill?" inquired Lady Chandos.

"So she says--in danger. But she is timid and fanciful. I shall not go."

"Will you allow me to see the letter, Emily?" asked Lady Chandos, in a grave tone.

"See it and welcome; read it out for the public benefit, if you will, mamma. Look at Harry, staring at me with his blue eyes! He deems me, no doubt, the very model of a loving wife."

"Emily! can you have read this letter?" asked Lady Chandos.

"Yes, I\'ve read it."

"Then how can you hesitate? Your husband is in danger: he may not survive: he will not, they say, unless a change takes place. You must hasten away by the first train."

"Mamma, you need not take the half of it for gospel. Madame de Mellissie is so wrapped up in her son, that if his finger aches she sends for a doctor, and asks whether it will mortify."

"Child! I must recommend you to go," was the impressive response of Lady Chandos.

"Of course I shall go; I never meant to hesitate," came the peevish answer. "But it is excessively tiresome."

It appeared that the letter to Mr. Chandos was also from Madame de Mellissie, asking him to urge his sister\'s instant departure. She finished her breakfast, and was leaving the room to prepare, when she saw me following.

"I do not want you just now, Miss Hereford. Pauline will see to my things."

"But I have my own to pack."

"Your own! What for? Alfred de Mellissie is not your husband, that you should hasten to him."

"But--am I not to go with you, madam?"

"Certainly not," was her emphatic answer. "It would be a needless expense and trouble."

I felt dumbfounded. "But, Madame de Mellissie, what am I to do?"

"Do! Why, stay here till my return. What else should you do? I shall be back in a few days at most. I know what Monsieur Alfred\'s danger is! Only, if I did not make the journey, madame la mère would hold me forth to all Paris as a model of barbarity. Mamma," she quickly added, turning to Lady Chandos, "I shall return here to finish my visit as soon as I can get away. It will not be a week before you will see me again. You can let Miss Hereford wait here for me, can\'t you? Can\'t you, Harry?"

"Provided Miss Hereford will make herself at home with us, which I fancy she has not yet done," was the reply of Mr. Chandos, looking at me with a smile. Lady Chandos simply bowed her head.

"Oh, she is one who always gives you the notion of being shy," carelessly replied Emily, as she ran up the staircase.

What was I to do? I could not say to her, "You shall take me;" but, after the conversation I had overheard, it was most unpleasant to me to stay. I ran after Emily. I told her that my remaining might not be really agreeable to Lady and Mr. Chandos. Her reply was, that they must make it agreeable, for there was no accommodation for me at Madame de Mellissie\'s.

"Look here, Anne; don\'t you be shy and stupid. I cannot drop you in the street like a waif, en route, and I cannot take you home. Suppose Alfred\'s illness should turn to typhus fever? would it be well for you to be there? But there\'s no room for you, and that\'s the fact."

"I disclosed to her my penniless condition, for some of my poor twenty-five shillings had melted on the journey from Paris, and I had but fifteen left. I begged her to lend me some money, and I would find my way alone to Nulle. Emily laughed heartily, but she did not give me any.

"I shall be back next week, child. Make yourself easy."

By mid-day she was gone, Pauline attending her, and Mr. Chandos escorting her to the station. I was left, with the words I had heard spoken, as to my unwelcome presence in the house, beating their refrain on my brain. Whether Lady Chandos remonstrated privately with her daughter against leaving me or whether she recognised it as a sort of necessity, and tacitly acquiesced in the arrangement, I had no means of knowing.

What was I to do with myself? Put on my things and go out? There was nothing else to do. As I came down with them on, Lady Chandos met me in the hall.

"Are you going abroad, Miss Hereford?"

"If you have no objection, madam. But I was only going because I felt at a loss for something to occupy myself with. Perhaps you can give me something to do, Lady Chandos?"

"I cannot aid you, I believe. It is a pity Madame de Mellissie should have left you here, for I fear you will find it dull; but I suppose there was no help for it. I speak for your sake, my dear," she kindly added.

"I should be so glad to do anything for you. I can sew."

"My maids do the sewing," she said. "You will find some pleasant walks in the vicinity. There is one to the left, as you leave the gates, exceedingly rural and quiet. You will be quite safe; it is an honest neighbourhood."

I found the walk she spoke of and stayed out for nearly two hours. Not a single house, but one, did I pass. I found afterwards that what few houses there were lay to the right. This one stood in view of the entrance gates, nearly opposite to the lodge; a substantial, moderate-sized house, closed at present, and displaying a board--"To Let." I had half a mind to open its front gate and explore the garden, but I had been out long enough, and turned to Chandos.

I was not to go home without an adventure. In passing through the small iron gate, by the side of the large ones, an awfully fierce great dog sprang forward, savagely barking. Back I flew, and shut the gate between us: why he did not leap over the gate, I don\'t know: he stood there barking, and rattling part of a chain that was attached to his collar. Never having been brought into contact with dogs, I was terribly afraid of fierce ones, and cowered there in an agony of fear, not daring to run away, lest the angry animal should leap the gate and spring upon me.

Footsteps came behind me, and I looked round, hoping for protection. It was Mr. Chandos. He saw what was the matter, and seemed to make but one bound to the gate.

"Stay there, Miss Hereford!"

He passed quietly through, and confronted the dog; the dog confronted him, barking still.

"Nero!"

The voice allayed the angry passions, and the dog stepped up. Mr. Chandos seized the end of the chain.

"You and I must have a settling for this, Nero. Will you come here, Miss Hereford, and I will teach him to know you, so that he does not alarm you again, should he get loose. He must have broken his chain."

"Oh, sir! Pray do not make me come near him!"

Mr. Chandos turned his face quickly towards me, "Are you afraid of dogs?"

"Rather, sir. I am of that one."

At this juncture, a groom came running up, in search of the dog. Mr. Chandos spoke sharply to him, and the man answered, in a tone of deprecation, that it was no fault of his; that the dog sometimes, in his fits of effort to get loose was as a "born devil," and in one of those fits had, a quarter of an hour before, snapped his chain, and burst through the stable window.

"He has run the fit off, then," said Mr. Chandos, "for he is quiet enough now. Take him back, and mind you secure him fast."

The man took the chain in his hand, and went off, leading the dog. Mr. Chandos opened the gate for me. I had not overcome the fright yet, and my face felt ashy pale.

"My poor child! It has indeed frightened you. Do you feel faint?"

"I shall not faint, sir. I never fainted in my life."

Without the least ceremony, he placed my hand within his arm, and walked on. A little to the right, underneath some thick cypress trees, there was a bench. He bade me sit down, and seated himself beside me.

"You will be all the better for resting here a minute or two. How did it happen? Where did you and Mr. Nero encounter each other?"

"I had been out walking, sir. Lady Chandos told me of a pretty walk there is to the left, outside the gates. In coming back, I was just inside the gate, when the dog came up, leaping and barking."

"And you were frightened?"

"Very much frightened. Had I not occasion, sir? One moment later, and he might have torn me to pieces."

"It is my dog," he resumed, "and I am exceedingly sorry he should have given you the alarm. Will you return good for evil?"

"Good for evil! In what manner, sir?" I asked.

"By not mentioning this to my mother," he replied. "She has a great dislike to dogs being kept on the premises. Some few months ago, when a friend of mine was dying, he asked me to take his dog--this one which has just frightened you--but Lady Chandos would only consent to its coming here on condition that it should be kept tied up. It is a valuable dog, though fierce on occasions, the confinement to which it is mostly condemned making it more fierce. I will take care it does not break bounds again, and I would prefer that my mother should not know of this."

"I will not tell her, sir. I suppose Lady Chandos dislikes dogs as much as I do."

"She does not dislike dogs: she rather likes them. But she objects--at least, she has objected latterly--to have dogs loose about the premises."

"She fears their going mad, perhaps?"

Mr. Chandos laughed. "No, she does not fear that. I must make you and Nero friends, Miss Hereford; you will then find how little he is to be dreaded. You shall come to the stables with me when he is tied up fast. How long have you known my sister?" he resumed, changing the subject.

"I knew her a little at Mademoiselle Barlieu\'s. I entered the school just before she left it."

"Then you must have known--have known--the circumstances under which she quitted it?"

He had begun the sentence rapidly, as if impelled to it by impulse, but after the hesitation, continued it more slowly.

"Yes, sir. They could not be kept from the school."

"A mad act--a mad act!" he murmured: "and--if I may read signs--heartily repented of. It is, I fancy, an exemplification of the old saying, Miss Hereford, \'Marry in haste, and repent at leisure.\' Poor Emily has leisure enough for it before her: she is only beginning life. I went over at the time to Mademoiselle Barlieu\'s."

"Yes, sir; I saw you when you were going away, and I hid myself in a niche of the hall while you passed. I knew you again as soon as I met you here."

"You must have a good memory for faces, then," he said, laughing.

"I think a circumstance made me recollect you, sir. It was, that your face struck upon me at Mademoiselle Barlieu\'s as being familiar to my memory; I felt sure that if I had not seen you before, I had seen so............