"But it was always intended that I should be equipped to work if need be," I said.

"Well," admitted Dorcas, "that was one of the reasons why we were so pleased to be able to give you such a good education."

"We might hear of something congenial," suggested Alison.

It was no use sitting down waiting to hear. I promised myself and them that as soon as they were settled in their new home I would go and find a post.

I was uneasy—not at the prospect of working but of leaving St. Erno's. I pictured myself in some household far away from Giza House when I should quickly be forgotten by its inhabitants. And what should I do? Become a governess like Miss Graham? It was the kind of post for which I was most suited. Perhaps as I had had a classical education more advanced than most rectory girls, I might teach in a girls' school. It would be less stultifying than working in some household where I was not considered worthy to mix with the family and yet was that little bit above the servants, which made it impossible for them to accept me. What was there for a young well-educated woman to do in this day and age?

I could not bear to think of the future. I began to say to myself: If I had never found the bronze shield the Traverses might not have come to Giza House. I should never have met Tybalt, and Oliver would never have met Sabina. Oliver and I might in time have recognized what a convenient thing it would have been for us to marry and we might have done so. We might have had a peaceful, mildly happy life together as so many people do; and I should have been spared the anguish of leaving everything that was important to me.

Sir Ralph came to the rescue. There was a cottage on his estate which was vacant and he would allow the Misses Osmond to have it for a peppercorn rent.

They were delighted. It had solved half the problem.

Sir Ralph was determined to be our benefactor. Lady Bodrean needed a companion—someone who would read to her whenever required to do so, assist her in her charities, give the help she needed when she entertained. In fact a secretary companion. Sir Ralph thought that I might be suitable for the post, and Lady Bodrean was ready to consider me.

Alison and Dorcas were delighted.

"After our disappointment everything is working out so well," they cried. "We have our cottage and it would be wonderful to have you not too far away. Just imagine, we should be able to see you frequently. Oh it would be wonderful... if ... er ... you could get along with Lady Bodrean."

"Ah, 'there's the rub,'" I quoted lightheartedly. But I felt far from that.

And not without reason. Lady Bodrean, I had always felt, had never really cared for me to join her daughter and nephew in the Keverall Court schoolroom. On the rare occasions when I had seen her I had been met by frosty stares.

She always reminded me of a ship, for with her voluminous petticoats and skirts which rustled as she walked she seemed to sail along without being aware of anyone in her path. I had never tried to ingratiate myself with her, being conscious of a certain antagonism. Now I was in a different position.

She received me in her private sitting room, a small apartment—as rooms went in Keverall Court—but it was about twice the size of the cottage rooms. It was overcrowded with furniture. On the mantelpiece were vases and ornaments very close together; there were cabinets filled with china and silver and a what-not in one corner of the room full of little china pieces. The chairs were covered by tapestry worked by Lady Bodrean herself. There were two firescreens also of tapestry and two stools. The frame with a new piece stood close to her chair and she was working at this when I was shown into her room.

She did not look up for quite a minute implying that she found her work more interesting than the new companion. It might have been disconcerting if I had been the timid sort.

Then: "Oh, it's Miss Osmond. You've come about the post. You may sit down."

I sat, my head high, the color in my cheeks.

"Your duties," she said, "will be to make yourself useful to me in any capacity which arises."

I said: "Yes, Lady Bodrean."

"You will look after my engagements, both social and philanthropic. You will read the papers to me each day. You will care for my two Pomeranians, Orange and Lemon." At the mention of their names the two dogs reclining on cushions on either side of her raised their heads and regarded me with contempt. Orange—or it might have been Lemon —barked; the other one sniffed. "Darlings," said Lady Bodrean with a tender smile, but her expression was immediately frosty when she turned back to me. "You will, of course, be available for anything I may require. Now I should like to hear you read a passage to me."

Opening The Times she handed it to me. I started to read of the resignation of Bismarck and the plan to cede Heligoland to Germany.

I was aware of her scrutinizing me as I read. She had a lorgnette attached to a gold chain about her waist and she quizzed me quite openly. The sort of treatment one must expect when one was about to become an employee, I supposed.

"Yes, that will do," she said in the middle of a sentence so that I knew that engaging a companion was of greater moment than the fate of Heligoland.

"I should like you to start . . . immediately. I hope that is convenient."

I said I should need a day or so to settle my affairs, though what affairs I was not sure. All I knew was that I wanted to postpone taking up my new post for I found the prospect depressing.

She graciously conceded that I might have the rest of that day and the next in which to prepare myself. The day after that she would expect me to take up my duties.

On the way back to the cottage—which had the delectable name of Rainbow Cottage although the only reason known for this was that the flowers which used to be grown in the garden were all the colors of the rainbow—I tried to think of the advantages of my new position, and told myself that while I was going to hate being employed by Lady Bodrean I would have opportunities of seeing Tybalt.

III

The Months of Bondage

My room at Keverall Court was close to that of Lady Bodrean, in case she should want me at any time. It was a pleasant enough room—all the rooms at Keverall were gracious, even the smallest—with its paneled walls and mullioned window. And from the window I could see the roof of Giza House, by which I was foolishly comforted.

I had not been in the house long when I came to the conclusion that Lady Bodrean disliked me. She would ring her bell quite often after I had retired for the night and would tell me peevishly that she could not sleep. I must make tea for her, or read to her until she dozed; and I would often sit shivering because she liked a cold bedroom, and she was comfortable enough under her blankets while I was often in my dressing gown. She was never satisfied with anything I did. If there was nothing of which to complain she was silent; if there was, then she would refer to it over and over again.

Her personal maid Jane commiserated with me.

"Her ladyship seems to have it in for you," she admitted. "It's often like that. I've seen it before. A regular servant's got a sort of dignity. There's always housemaids or parlormaids or lady's maid wanted. But companions and such like—well that's up another street."

I suppose some natures could have borne it better than mine, but I had never been one to accept injustice; and in the old days when I had come to this house I had come on equal terms with Theodosia. It was very hard to accept the new position and it was only the alternative of banishment from St. Erno which made me stay on.

I took my meals alone in my room. During them I usually read the books I had borrowed from Giza House. I didn't see Tybalt during this time for he and his father had gone away for a while on some expedition into the Midlands, but Tabitha always had books for me.

She would say: "Tybalt thought this would interest you."

These books, my visits to Tabitha, and the knowledge that Dorcas and Alison were happily settled provided the only brightness in my life at that time.

I saw Theodosia now and then. She would have been quite pleasant to me if her mother would have allowed it. There was nothing malicious or proud about Theodosia. She was negative; she took her color from people about her. She would never be actively unkind, but at the same time she did little to alleviate my position. Perhaps she remembered the past when I had been inclined to bully her.

When I saw Sir Ralph he would ask me how I was getting on and he gave that amused look which I had seen so often. I could not say to him: "I dislike your wife and I would leave her tomorrow if I did not know that however unhappy I am here I should be far more so elsewhere."

I went to Rainbow Cottage to see Dorcas and Alison as often as I could. It was an interesting little place about three hundred years old, I think, and it had been built in the days when any family who could build a cottage in a night could claim the land on which it had been erected as their own. It was the custom in those days to collect bricks and tiles and to start building as soon as it was dark and work through the night. Four walls and a roof constituted a dwelling and that was done by morning. After that, the place could be added to. That was what had happened to Rainbow Cottage. When the Bodreans had acquired the cottage they had used it for their dependents and added to it considerably, but some of the old features remained, such as the old talfat—a sort of ledge high up on the wall on which children used to sleep and which was reached by a ladder. Now it boasted a moderately good kitchen with a cloam oven in which Dorcas used to bake the most delicious bread I had ever tasted; then there was a copper in which they cooked the scalded milk to make clotted cream. They were really very happy in Rainbow Cottage with its pleasant little garden; though of course they missed the spacious rectory.