Neither was in sound health. The mother had an interesting face; the
daughter had a touch of beauty; but something morbid appeared on the
countenance of each. They lived a strange life, lonely, silent; the
stillness of the house unbroken by a note of music, unrelieved by a
sound of laughter. In the neighbourhood they had no friends; only at
long intervals did a London acquaintance come thus far to call upon
them. Hut for the presence of Piers Otway at meals, and sometimes in
the afternoon or evening, they would hardly have known conversation.
For when Hannaford was at home, his sour muteness discouraged any
kind of talk; in his absence, mother and daughter soon exhausted all
they had to say to each other, and read or brooded or nursed their
headaches apart.

With the coming of Irene, gloom vanished. It had always been so,
since the beginning of her girlhood; the name of Irene Derwent
signified miseries forgotten, mirthful hours, the revival of health
and hope. Unable to resist her influence, Hannaford always kept as
much as possible out of the way when she was under his roof; the
conflict between inclination to unbend and stubborn coldness towards
his family made him too uncomfortable. Vivaciously tactful in this
as in all things, Irene had invented a pleasant fiction which
enabled her to meet Mr. Hannaford without embarrassment; she always
asked him "How is your neuralgia?" And the man, according as he
felt, made answer that it was better or worse. That neuralgia was
often a subject of bitter jest between Mrs. Hannaford and Olga, but
it had entered into the life of the family, and at times seemed to
be believed in even by the imagined sufferer.

Nothing could have been more characteristic of Irene. Wit at the