What on earth could the secret be?
And now, for a time, I retire into the background, and cease personally to tell the story.
CHAPTER VI.
BLANCHE HERIOT.
ON one of those promising days that we now and then see in February, which seem all the more warm and lovely in contrast with the passing winter, the parsonage of White Littleham put on its gayest appearance within—perhaps in response to the fair face of nature without. A group of four girls had collected in the drawing-room. One was taking the brown holland covers from the chairs, sofa, and footstools; another was bringing out certain ornaments, elegant trifles, displayed only on state occasions; the other two were filling glasses with evergreens and hot-house flowers. It was the same room in which you once saw poor Mrs. Strange lying on her road to death. The parsonage received three young ladies to share in the advantages of foreign governesses, provided for the education of its only daughter, Cecilia.