when she was complaining to Lady Cicely Treherne of her hard lot. She
had been telling her she was nothing more than a lay-figure in the
house.

"My husband is housekeeper now, and cook, and all, and makes me
delicious dishes, I can tell you; SUCH curries! I couldn't keep the
house with five pounds a week, so now he does it with three: and I never
get the carriage, because walking is best for me; and he takes it out
every night to make money. I don't understand it."

Lady Cicely suggested that perhaps Dr. Staines thought it best for her
to be relieved of all worry, and so undertook the housekeeping.

"No, no, no," said Rosa; "I used to pay them all a part of their bills,
and then a little more, and so I kept getting deeper; and I was ashamed
to tell Christie, so that he calls deceit; and oh, he spoke to me so
cruelly once! But he was very sorry afterwards, poor dear! Why are girls
brought up so silly? all piano, and no sense; and why are men sillier
still to go and marry such silly things? A wife! I am not so much as a
servant. Oh, I am finely humiliated, and," with a sudden hearty naivete
all her own, "it serves me just right."

While Lady Cicely was puzzling this out, in came a letter. Rosa opened
it, read it, and gave a cry like a wounded deer.

"Oh!" she cried, "I am a miserable woman. What will become of me?"

The letter informed her bluntly that her husband drove his brougham out
every night to pursue a criminal amour.