'No, indeed, miss.'

'Then I suppose she must have peeped in at the door and seen that
Miss Darrell was asleep,' I said.

'I don't see how she could have opened that door without my hearing
her, miss. It was shut fast, I know.'

It had been shut when I went in through the dressing-room. I was
puzzled by this incident, small as it was. I knew that Augusta
Darrell hated her stepdaughter, and I could not bear to think of
that secret enemy hovering about the sick-room. I was puzzled too by
the look which I had seen in her face--no common look, and not easy
to be understood. That she hated me, I had no doubt; but there had
been fear as well as aversion in that look, and I could not imagine
any possible reason for her fearing such an insignificant person as
myself.

The rest of that evening and night passed without any event worth
recording. I kept the door of communication between the bedroom and
dressing-room wide open all night, determined that Augusta Darrell
should not be in that room without my knowledge; but the night
passed, and she never came near us.

When I went into the garden early the next morning to gather the
flowers for Milly's room, I found Peter at work again. He looked
very white and feeble, scarcely fit to be about just yet; but there
he was, sweeping the fallen leaves into little heaps, ready for his
barrow. He came to me while I was cutting the late roses for my