those she loved. She could imagine no life happier than hers might have
been. But she had sinned, and the Lord had punished her for sin, and she
must bear her punishment uncomplainingly, giving Him thanks that He had
imposed no heavier one upon her.

Such reflection was the substance of Esther's mind for three months after
William's departure; and in the afternoons, about three o'clock, when her
work paused, Esther's thoughts would congregate and settle on the great
misfortune of her life--William's desertion.

It was one afternoon at the beginning of December; Mrs. Latch had gone
upstairs to lie down. Esther had drawn her chair towards the fire. A
broken-down race-horse, his legs bandaged from his knees to his fetlocks,
had passed up the yard; he was going for walking exercise on the downs,
and when the sound of his hoofs had died away Esther was quite alone. She
sat on her wooden chair facing the wide kitchen window. She had advanced
one foot on the iron fender; her head leaned back, rested on her hand. She
did not think--her mind was lost in vague sensation of William, and it was
in this death of active memory that something awoke within her, something
that seemed to her like a flutter of wings; her heart seemed to drop from
its socket, and she nearly fainted away, but recovering herself she stood
by the kitchen table, her arms drawn back and pressed to her sides, a
death-like pallor over her face, and drops of sweat on her forehead. The
truth was borne in upon her; she realised in a moment part of the awful
drama that awaited her, and from which nothing could free her, and which
she would have to live through hour by hour. So dreadful did it seem, that
she thought her brain must give way. She would have to leave Woodview. Oh,
the shame of confession! Mrs. Barfield, who had been so good to her, and
who thought so highly of her. Her father would not have her at home; she
would be homeless in London. No hope of obtaining a situation.... they