‘O, I cannot bear it, I cannot bear it!’ the poor thing burst out aloud, clasping her little fingers, and pressing them back against her forehead, as if she wanted to break them.

Then she walked hurriedly up and down the room.

‘And this must go on for days and days, and I must see it.’

She looked about nervously for something to clutch.  There was a muslin kerchief lying on the table; she took it up and tore it into shreds as she walked up and down, and then pressed it into hard balls in her hand.

‘And Anthony,’ she thought, ’he can do this without caring for what I feel.  O, he can forget everything:  how he used to say he loved me—­how he used to take my hand in his as we walked—­how he used to stand near me in the evenings for the sake of looking into my eyes.’

‘Oh, it is cruel, it is cruel!’ she burst out again aloud, as all those love-moments in the past returned upon her.  Then the tears gushed forth, she threw herself on her knees by the bed, and sobbed bitterly.

She did not know how long she had been there, till she was startled by the prayer-bell; when, thinking Lady Cheverel might perhaps send some one to inquire after her, she rose, and began hastily to undress, that there might be no possibility of her going down again.  She had hardly unfastened her hair, and thrown a loose gown about her, before there was a knock at the door, and Mrs. Sharp’s voice said—­’Miss Tina, my lady wants to know if you’re ill.’

Caterina opened the door and said, ’Thank you, dear Mrs. Sharp; I have a bad headache; please tell my lady I felt it come on after singing.’  ‘Then, goodness me! why arn’t you in bed, istid o’ standing shivering there, fit to catch your death?  Come, let me fasten up your hair and tuck you up warm.’

’O no, thank you; I shall really be in bed very soon.  Good-night, dear Sharpy; don’t scold; I will be good, and get into bed.’

Caterina kissed her old friend coaxingly, but Mrs. Sharp was not to be ‘come over’ in that way, and insisted on seeing her former charge in bed, taking away the candle which the poor child had wanted to keep as a companion.  But it was impossible to lie there long with that beating heart; and the little white figure was soon out of bed again, seeking relief in the very sense of chill and uncomfort.  It was light enough for her to see about her room, for the moon, nearly at full, was riding high in the heavens among scattered hurrying clouds.  Caterina drew aside the window-curtain; and, sitting with her forehead pressed against the cold pane, looked out on the wide stretch of park and lawn.

How dreary the moonlight is! robbed of all its tenderness and repose by the hard driving wind.  The trees are harassed by that tossing motion, when they would like to be at rest; the shivering grass makes her quake with sympathetic cold; and the willows by the pool, bent low and white under that invisible harshness, seem agitated and helpless like herself.  But she loves the scene the better for its sadness:  there is some pity in it.  It is not like that hard unfeeling happiness of lovers, flaunting in the eyes of misery.