Mrs. Lenoir shuddered.
"Has it been snowing?"
"Oh, for a couple of hours! The ground looks beautiful; but everything is beautiful now." Lizzie looked towards the window. "Ah, you didn't see the snow because the blind was down. Do come, Mrs. Lenoir."
"No, Lizzie, you must not try to persuade me; it is useless."
"But you are so much alone--you never go anywhere! And this is the first time you have allowed me to come into your room. You are unhappy, I know, and you don't deserve to be. Let me love you, Mrs. Lenoir."
"Lizzie, I must live as I have always lived. It is my fate."
"Has it been so all your life? When you were my age, were you the same as you are now? Ah, no; I can read faces, and yours has answered me. I wish I could comfort you."
"It is not in your power. Life for me contains only one possible comfort, only one possible joy; but so remote, so unlikely ever to come, that I fear I shall die without meeting it. Leave me now; I have a great deal of work to get through to-night."
Lizzie, perceiving that further persuasion would be useless, turned to leave the room. As she did so, her eyes fell upon the picture of the girl-woman hanging over the mantelshelf. With a cry of delight she stepped close to it.
"How beautiful! Is it your portrait, Mrs. Lenoir, when you were a girl? Ah, yes, it is like you."