Her constant prayer was that she should be spared the torture of having to give up her dear boys to such a mother and such a step-father.  She thought she saw little, loving, delicate Charlie shrinking into himself, and withering under the contemptuous indifference neglect of the Castleford household; and Cis—­bolder and stronger—­hardening into defiance or deceit under the same influence.

By the sort of agreement arrived at between Mr. Newton and Mrs. Ormonde, it was decided that so long as Katherine provided for the maintenance of her nephews, their mother was only entitled to have them with her during the Christmas holidays; and Colonel Ormonde was with some difficulty persuaded to allow the munificent sum of thirty pounds a year toward the education of his step-sons.

This definite settlement was a great relief to Katherine’s heart.  How earnestly she resolved to keep herself on her infinitesimal stipend, and save every other penny for her boys!  Of the trouble before her, in removing them from Sandbourne to some inferior, because cheaper, school, she would not think.  Sufficient to the day was the evil thereof.

She therefore applied herself diligently to her duties.  These were varied, though somewhat mechanical.

Mrs. Needham’s particular den was a very comfortable, well-furnished room at the back of the house, crowded with books and newspapers, and prospectuses, magazines, and all possible impedimenta of journalism, on the outer edge of which women were beginning with faltering footsteps tentatively to tread.  Mrs. Needham not only wrote “provincial letters” (with a difference!), but contributed social and statistical papers to several of the leading periodicals; and one of Katherine’s duties was to write out her rough notes, and make extracts from the books, Blue and others, the reports and papers which Mrs. Needham had marked.  Then there were lots of letters to be answered and MSS. to be corrected.

Besides these, Mrs. Needham asked Katherine as a favor to help her in her house-keeping, as it was a thing she hated; “and whatever you do,” was her concluding instructions, “do not see too much of cook’s doings.  She is a clever woman, and after all that can be said about the feast of reason, the success of my little dinners depends on her.  I don’t think she takes things, but she is a little reckless, and I never could keep accounts.”

Katherine therefore found her time fully filled.  This, however, kept her from thinking too much, and her kind chief was pleased with all she did.  Her mind was tolerable at rest about the boys, her friends stuck gallantly to her through the shipwreck of her fortune, and yet her heart was heavy.  She could not look forward with hope, or back without pain.  She dared not even let herself think freely, for she well knew the cause of her depression, and had vowed to herself to master it, to hide it away, and never allow her mental vision to dwell upon it.