’I had put down the exact date, May 7.  It was last year, Ursula.  I meant to adhere to the very day and hour; but before February closed my hopes had suffered eclipse.

’All at once Miss Hamilton’s manner became cold and constrained, as you see it now.  Her soft shyness, that had been so favourable a sign, disappeared entirely.  She avoided me on every occasion.  She seemed to fear to be alone with me a moment.  Her nervousness was so visible and so distressing that I often left her in anger.  A barrier—­vague, and yet substantial—­seemed built up between us.

’She began to neglect her work, and then to make excuses.  She was overdone, and suffered from headache.  The school-work tired her.  You have heard it all, Ursula:  I need not repeat it.

’One by one she dropped her duties.  The parish knew her no more.  She certainly looked ill.  Her melancholy increased.  Something was evidently preying on her mind.

’One day Miss Darrell spoke to me.  She had been very kind, and had fed my hopes all this time.  But now she was the bearer of bad news.

’She came to me in the study, while I was waiting for Hamilton.  She looked very pale and discomposed, and asked if she might speak to me.  She was very unhappy about me, but she did not think it right to let it go on.  Gladys wanted me to know.  And then it all came out.

’It could never be as I wished.  Miss Hamilton had been trying all this time to like me, and once or twice she thought she had succeeded, but the feeling had never lasted for many days.  I was not the right person.  This was the substance of Miss Darrell’s explanation.

’"You know Gladys,” she went on, “how sensitive and affectionate her nature is; how she hates to inflict pain.  She is working herself up into a fever at the thought that you will speak to her again.

’"It was too terrible last time, Etta,” she said to me, bursting into tears.  “I cannot endure it again.  How am I to tell him about Claude?”

’"About Claude!” I almost shouted.  Miss Darrell looked frightened at my violence.  She shrank back, and turned still paler.  I noticed her hands trembled.

’"Oh, have you not noticed?” she returned feebly.  “Oh, what a cruel task this is! and you are so good,—­so good.”

’"Tell me what you mean!” I replied angrily, for I felt so savage at that moment that a word of sympathy was more than I could bear.  You would not have known me at that moment, Ursula.  I am not easily roused, as you know, but the blow was too sudden.  I must have forgotten myself to have spoken to Miss Darrell in that tone.  When I looked at her, her mouth was quivering like a frightened child’s, and there were tears in her eyes.

’"I scarcely know that it is you,” she faltered.  “Are men all like that when their wills are crossed?  It is not my fault that you are hurt in this way.  And it is not Gladys’s either.  She has tried—­I am sure she has tried her hardest—­to bring herself to accede to your wishes.  But a woman cannot always regulate her own heart.”