The young man blushed again, this time with satisfaction. And am I not a good-natured chap?" he said, “and very grateful for all you are doing for me?'

"Oh, yes," said Hester, eagerly.

What is it, then, little puss?

"I think," said Hester, making a great effort, "that you swear too much at the pain and the doctors, who are doing a great deal for you. And I think you ought not to grumble, as you do, at Lady Humphrey."

By Jove!" cried young Humphrey, and the mouth under his bandages began to widen, and the locks of black hair to tremble with laughter. "Well, well, little sweetheart!" he said, "I must try and mend my manners. And now, though you can lecture a fellow so well, perhaps you would not mind sharing his troubles?"

"What troubles," asked Hester, anxiously.

Oh, fearful troubles!" he said, with an air of desperation. "I have a terrible debt, and not a farthing to pay it with." "What is to be done? cried Hester, in distress. "Have you asked Lady Humphrey for the money?"

The young man groaned. She would not give me a penny," he said, very deeply in his chest ; "not if I went upon my knees to her. But, perhaps," he added, bent upon trying how far the little girl would go to serve him—" perhaps she would do it if you asked her.'

Hester turned pale, but this he could not see. "I don't think she would listen to me at all," she said trembling.

Oh yes, she might," said Pierce Humphrey. "Will you promise me to try? It is my only hope," he added, tragically.

The next instant he heard Hester's light foot across the floor, and she was gone. Then Pierce Humphrey got a little anxious as to how his joke might end. He did want the money, but not that the child should get into trouble.

"Lady Humphrey," said little Hester, standing close to the lady's elbow; "if you please, Lady Humphrey, Mr. Pierce is in bad need of money.

Is he indeed?" said her ladyship, sitting upright in her chair.

"Yes," said Hester, shaking with fear. "He wants a large sum of money to pay a debt. And I am sure, Lady Humphrey, that as you love him so much you will give it him, and not let him be unhappy."

"And pray, little madam," asked Lady Humphrey, with her hard mouth tightened, and her chin at a right angle with her throat, "when did you become my son's confidante?

"He told me just now," said Hester, fading under the angry eyes, but not flinching.

"He did?" said Lady Humphrey; " yet he has not thought proper to mention the subject to his mother. I am to give you money for him because I love him so much. Pray, why do you presume that I love him so much? Do you love him yourself, little mistress? "

"No," said Hester, guiltily, hanging her head; "I like him very much, but I do not love him. But then," she added, apologetically, "you know I am not his mother, Lady Humpphrey. If I were his mother, I am sure I should love him dearly and I am sure I should give him everything he asked for."

Lady Humphrey took one long look at the pale, shrinking, persistent face, and said no more. She had a stormy scene with her son after that; but the debt (not so great as he had described it) was paid.

Pierce Humphrey's eyes were cured. Almost the first use he made of them was to take a peep of curiosity at his little nurse's face. Hester was sitting, unconscious, on her stool before the fire. It was a slender young figure, in the usual white frock. Her hair hung round her neck, a luminous cloud of curls, which were always getting cut, and always growing long. Her eyes were wide open and serious, fixed on the flaming wood. Her mouth was sweet, but tightened at the moment into an expression almost of pain. Her head leaned to one side in an attitude of attention. Her hands clasped her knee, an old babyish trick, which in a short time after this must be outgrown. It was the attitude of her infantine discourse to the pictures; her reveries of enthusiasm or trouble; her meditations.

She thought her patient was asleep. The fire flared and fell. Burning sparks lay scattered on the hearth. What terrible scene in her days that were to come was Hester forseeing through the medium of this tumult and débris? Crash went the wood, and the tall flame was felled.

"Mother," said Pierce next morning, "that little puss will be a beautiful woman.'

"Will she?" said Lady Humphrey, drily. And the next day Hester was sent back to her school.

Months passed away after that, and at last it did seem as though the time that Hester dreaded had arrived; and she felt herself shaken off and forgotten. The schoolmistress clamoured for the money that was due to her, and Lady Humphrey listened, considered, remembered. Yes, to be sure, the little

beggar must not starve. She ordered her carriage, and took her way to the school. A wild light of expectation sprang to Hester's eyes, as the well-known horses pulled up at the door, and she was quickly by the side of her benefactress. Ah, how tall and awkward and plain the girl had grown Anxiety, it was true, had not beautified poor Hester. Her eyes had dark circles round them, and her cheeks were pale and thin. Her poor frocks were outgrown, making her look a grotesque figure.

"What is to be done?" said Lady Humphrey. "This creature must earn her bread."

CHAPTER III

HESTER, A DRESSMAKER'S APPRENTICE

So, after a few more days, Hester was transferred to a new abode, a needle and thread were put into her hand, and she was told that she had become a dressmaker's apprentice.

She sat in a gloomy room and sewed long seams without lifting her eyes. All round her were busy chattering young women, whose conversation informed her that they were well supplied with fathers, brothers, mothers, and sisters. Their gossip was of vulgar beaux and holiday treats, the last visit to the pit of the theatre, the next Sunday's excurison to Ranelagh or Richmond. They criticised Hester, even audibly, when the mistress was out of the room; remarked on her outgrown frocks and broken boots, and tittered at the blushes in her face. By and by, when they began to suspect that pride as well as shyness kept her sitting in her corner aloof, they mercilessly sneered her down. There was Hester, desolate, against a whole laughing, joking, jeering band.

The mistress of the establishment was not an unkind woman, but her windows full of millinery were an ornament to Sloane Street, and she lived amongst her bonnets and feathers. Her shop was gay, and her customers were many, and she had little time to notice Hester Cashel. She did not know that the girl was unhappy. But Hester was learning her business, all the more surely and rapidly, because of her painful isolation in the workroom. Hasty stitches had to do instead of sighs, and anxiety for the pattern of a trimming, or the goring of a skirt, often held off the necessity for tears. But by and by the assistant in the showroom began to whisper to the mistress in the workroom that "that girl 'Ester had uncommon nice taste." And presently the apprentices began

to pause in their persecution and stare when particular work was handed over their heads, and entrusted to the fingers of their victim.

After some time it dawned upon Hester that she was growing quite expert at her business. She could cut out a satin bodice, and plait in a voluminous court train to fit a dainty waist as deftly as any mistress of the art who ever handled a needle. She had also devices of her own in the matter of trimmings which were apt to charm the fancy of fine customers. "Give it to young Cashel," the mistress would say at length whenever there was anything pretty to be done.

She was seventeen by the time this point was gained, and womanhood was beginning to look out of her troubled eves. She was still shabby Hester, untidy Hester, in spite of all her efforts to be neat; and the envy of others did not fail to make her conscious of her needs. Things that had once been indifferent now pressed on her sorely. Shame oppressed, and bitterness afflicted her. The past, with its intervals of sunshine, was gone, and the fullness of the present was swelling painfully around her.

There came an hour, however, when the sneers and the insults that had harassed her were silenced. Hester spoke out once, and frightened her bugbear away for ever.

One day an unusual supply of nice work fell to her share. An envious spirit had been making merry all the morning over her "embroidery," as she called the poor stains and discolourments of Miss Cashel's frock. Hester suddenly stood up, and spoke as no one had ever heard her speak before.

"

Young woman!" she said, "for two years and a half I have borne your ill-usage; but I give you notice that I will bear it no longer. What if I am poor and friendless, and wear shabby clothes? Is it an insult to you? You should rather thank God that you, at least, have got plenty of flaunting gowns, and brass jewellery. If you please, you will annoy me no more."

It happened that the mistress entered the room just as Hester began to speak. The words " for two years and a half I have borne your ill-usage" smote her ears like a reproach; for she had known that there were many who were jealous of Hester. The girl did not attempt to hide her hot cheeks and sparkling eyes, but held herself erect, amidst the amazement of the room, busying her trembling fingers with her work.

The apprentices sat thunderstricken, expecting a scene; but the mistress made no remark. It was in the middle of the night before that she had come upon Hester kneeling by her

baby's crib, hushing the child to sleep, while the nurse snored close by; and this mistress was not an unkind, nor a stupid

woman.

That evening, just when it was time for the apprentices to go home, she made her appearance in the workroom with a parcel in her hand.

"

'Ester Cashel," she said aloud, "I have brought you some fine gray stuff to make you a gown, a piece of black silk to make you an apron, and a yard of blue ribbon that you may tie up your 'air as the other young women wear it. And as for the cost, I owe you much more than the price of these things for hover work, which you have cheerfully done.'

The apprentices put on their bonnets in silence, and went away to digest the shock. Hester was left sitting in the deserted workroom to plan and cut out her new dress. And she did it right skilfully.

"I declare that girl is quite a picture in her new things!" said the kind-hearted milliner to her husband. "And I do wish that that fine lady who sent her here would take a little notice of her sometimes. She's different from the other girls, and they're not kind to her, and she don't seem to take to hany of them. She never takes a 'oliday, and never gets a breath of hair unless I send her to the park with the children. She does her work well, but it's plain she's too good for it."

"Does she grumble about it then?" asked the husband, a matter-of-fact person who kept his wife's accounts. These two worthies were at their tea when this conversation occurred, in their neat little parlour behind the shop.

"Grumble!" said the milliner. "Not a word out of her 'ead. And she'd work her fingers to a bone at a pinch. But it's plain to see she's been born and bred a lady. And I do wish that fine madam would come to see her now and again. I don't like the 'ole charge of such a one upon my shoulders."

It was characteristic of Lady Humphrey that one day about this time she made her appearance in our milliner's shop, being forgetful at the moment of the very existence of Hester. Her thoughts were busy with strange matters at the time; but she wanted a new bonnet all the same.

Sweetly pretty!" cried the milliner, taking a step backward, and having mounted her most stupendous chapeau on Lady Humphrey's severe buff braids. "How sweetly pretty to be sure! And how exceedingly thoughtful of your ladyship to remember poor 'Ester. For I don't take this favour to myself, your ladyship; you'll excuse me for saying that I know some