'I could see that by your looks when I came in.'

'Fancy not getting a single one,' she said sadly. 'Surely there
must be people somewhere who want governesses?'

'Yes; but those who want them, and can afford to have them, get them
mostly by friends' recommendations; whilst those who want them, and
can't afford to have them, make use of their poor relations.'

'What shall I do?'

'Never mind it. Go on living with me. Don't let the difficulty
trouble your mind so; you think about it all day. I can keep you,
Cythie, in a plain way of living. Twenty-five shillings a week do
not amount to much truly; but then many mechanics have no more, and
we live quite as sparingly as journeymen mechanics. . . It is a
meagre narrow life we are drifting into,' he added gloomily, 'but it
is a degree more tolerable than the worrying sensation of all the
world being ashamed of you, which we experienced at Hocbridge.'

'I couldn't go back there again,' she said.

'Nor I. O, I don't regret our course for a moment. We did quite
right in dropping out of the world.' The sneering tones of the
remark were almost too laboured to be real. 'Besides,' he
continued, 'something better for me is sure to turn up soon. I wish
my engagement here was a permanent one instead of for only two
months. It may, certainly, be for a longer time, but all is
uncertain.'