for you."

"Oh, ma'am, will you please tell me what it is?" exclaimed Fan, her voice
trembling with eagerness.

"Perhaps you will do it without my telling you, Fan. I shall leave you to
think about it and find out what it is for yourself. I must only tell you
this; I have not taken you into my house because I am charitable and like
doing good to the poor. I am not charitable, and care nothing about the
poor. I have taken you in for my own pleasure; and as I think well of
you, I am going to trust you implicitly. You may stay in this room when I
am out, or go into the back room on this floor, where you can look out on
the garden, and amuse yourself with the books and pictures till I come
back. I am going out now, and at one o'clock Rosie will give you some
dinner. Take no notice of her if she teases you. Mind me, and not the
servants--they are nothing."

Miss Starbrow then changed her dress and went out, leaving Fan to her own
devices, wondering what it was that she could do for her mistress, and
feeling a little trouble about the maid who would give her her dinner at
one o'clock; and after a while she went to explore that apartment at the
back Miss Starbrow had spoken of. It was a large room, nearly square,
with cream-coloured walls and dark red dado, and a polished floor, partly
covered with a Turkish carpet; but there was very little furniture in it,
and the atmosphere seemed chill and heavy, for it was the old unrenewed
air of a room that was never used. On a large centre table a number of
artistic objects were lying together in a promiscuous jumble: Japanese
knick-knacks; an ivory card-case that had lost its cover, and a broken-
bladed paper-knife; glove and collar and work-boxes of sandal-wood,
mother-of-pearl, and papier-mache, with broken hinges; faded fans and