A soul apart indeed, how far apart none of them quite realised; yet near enough to love—­and hate.  As the days went by and Esther drooped like a graceful plant athirst for water there grew in Aunt Amy’s twisted brain a slow corroding anger.  The timid, bitter anger of a weak nature which is often more deadly than the lordly passion of the strong.

If she could only do something.  If she could only outwit “Them”!  She would do anything at all, if she could only find the thing to do.  It was terrible to be so helpless.  It was maddening to have to be so careful.  Yet careful she must be, she never forgot that.  Often as she went about the house or stood in the sunny kitchen rolling out her flaky pie-crust, she pondered over ways and means.  But none seemed suitable.  Some of her plans were fantastic to a degree, but she always had sense enough to reject them in the end.  In her planning she was conscious of no sense of right or wrong but only of suitability.  There could be no question of right or wrong in dealing with “Them.”  They were outside the pale.  No.  What she wanted was something simple and effective.  A little poison, now—­in a pie?  But Amy knew nothing of poison, nor how to obtain any, nor how to use it effectively in a pie when once obtained.  She might consult the doctor perhaps?  But something warned Aunt Amy that the doctor would not take kindly to the idea of a little poison in a pie.  So this beautiful scheme had to be given up.  She sighed.

“What a big sigh, Auntie!” Esther, who was sitting at the table peeling apples, looked up questioningly.  “A penny for your thoughts.”

A look of cunning came over Aunt Amy’s face.  And instead of speaking her real thoughts she said, “I was thinking of weddings, Esther.”

“But why the sigh?”

“I don’t like weddings.  Once there was a young girl going to be married.  She was very happy.  She was so happy that she was afraid to look at her own face in the glass.  And it was eleven o’clock on Tuesday.  I mean she was waiting for eleven o’clock on Tuesday.  She was to be married then.  But just one minute before the time, something happened—­the clock stopped, I think.  Anyway eleven o’clock on Tuesday never came.  So she could not get married.  And she grew old and her flowers fell to pieces.  It was very sad.”

“Poor Auntie!”

Aunt Amy moved uneasily.  “Do you know who the girl was, Esther?”

“Don’t you know, Auntie?”

“No, that is, I am never sure.  Sometimes I think I used to know her.  But she’s gone.  I never see her now.  I’d like to find her if I could.”

“You will find her some day, Auntie.  Try not to fret about it.”

It was seldom indeed that Aunt Amy spoke even thus vaguely of that other self of hers which she had lost in the tragedy of her youth.  Esther’s heart was full of pity as she listened.  What was her own trouble compared to this?  She at least would have her memories.