He had no time to alter the expression of his face for its usual grave serenity:  Kitty saw the change at once, and spoke of it with her accustomed want of tact.

“How handsome you look!  What are you thinking about?” she said, gazing up at him with her own eyes bright with wonder, and her cheeks glowing with the delicate carmine of the frosty air.

“I am thinking that you look more like a rose than ever,” answered David turning her attention from himself by a compliment, and beginning to admire the flowers, still with that flushed and kindled look on his own face.

Christie crept upstairs, and, sitting in the dark, decided with the firmness of despair to go away, lest she should betray the secret that possessed her, a dead hope now, but still too dear to be concealed.

“Mr. Power told me to come to him when I got tired of this.  I’ll say I am tired and try something else, no matter what:  I can bear any thing, but to stand quietly by and see David marry that empty-hearted girl, who dares to show that she desires to win him.  Out of sight of all this, I can conquer my love, at least hide it; but if I stay I know I shall betray myself in some bitter minute, and I’d rather die than do that.”

Armed with this resolution, Christie went the next day to Mr. Power, and simply said:  “I am not needed at the Sterlings any more:  can you give me other work to do?”

Mr. Power’s keen eye searched her face for a moment, as if to discover the real motive for her wish.  But Christie had nerved herself to bear that look, and showed no sign of her real trouble, unless the set expression of her lips, and the unnatural steadiness of her eyes betrayed it to that experienced reader of human hearts.

Whatever he suspected or saw, Mr. Power kept to himself, and answered in his cordial way: 

“Well, I’ve been expecting you would tire of that quiet life, and have plenty of work ready for you.  One of my good Dorcases is tired out and must rest; so you shall take her place and visit my poor, report their needs, and supply them as fast as we can.  Does that suit you?”

“Entirely, sir.  Where shall I live?” asked Christie, with an expression of relief that said much.

“Here for the present.  I want a secretary to put my papers in order, write some of my letters, and do a thousand things to help a busy man.  My old housekeeper likes you, and will let you take a duster now and then if you don’t find enough other work to do.  When can you come?”

Christie answered with a long breath of satisfaction:  “To-morrow, if you like.”

“I do:  can you be spared so soon?”

“Oh, yes! they don’t want me now at all, or I would not leave them.  Kitty can take my place:  she needs protection more than I; and there is not room for two.”  She checked herself there, conscious that a tone of bitterness had crept into her voice.  Then quite steadily she added: