to halo them all. Even the sour Miss Bertrams could not annoy her; she
thought them sensible and clever; even the tiresome Mrs. Minchin of
Minchin Hall, the "gusher" of the county, who "adored" all mankind and
ill-treated her step-daughter, even she was dubbed "very kind," till
Mrs. Roughsedge, next day, kindled a passion in the girl's eyes by some
tales of the step-daughter. Mrs. Colwood wondered whether, indeed, she
_could_ be bored, as Mrs. Minchin had not achieved it. Those who talk
easily and well, like Diana, are less keenly aware, she thought, of the
platitudes of their neighbors. They are not defenceless, like the shy
and the silent.

Nevertheless, it was clear that if Diana welcomed the neighbors with
pleasure she often saw them go with relief. As soon as the house was
clear of them, she would stand pensively by the fire, looking down into
the blaze like one on whom a dream suddenly descends--then would often
call her dog, and go out alone, into the winter twilight. From these
rambles she would return grave--sometimes with reddened eyes. But at all
times, as Mrs. Colwood soon began to realize, there was but a thin line
of division between her gayety and some inexplicable sadness, some
unspoken grief, which seemed to rise upon her and overshadow her, like a
cloud tangled in the woods of spring. Mrs. Colwood could only suppose
that these times of silence and eclipse were connected in some way with
her father and her loss of him. But whenever they occurred, Mrs. Colwood
found her own mind invincibly recalled to that name on the box of
papers, which still haunted her, still brought with it a vague sense of
something painful and harrowing--a breath of desolation, in strange
harmony, it often seemed, with certain looks and moods of Diana. But
Mrs. Colwood searched her memory in vain. And, indeed, after a little
while, some imperious instinct even forbade her the search--so rapid and
strong was the growth of sympathy with the young life which had called