Gratia's Trials — page 187: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

178 GRATIA’S TRIALS. get another place, and lll do my best to help you to oneas will Suit you.” ‘‘Tf I could be of any use to you,” hesitated Gratia, scarcely daring to believe the good fortune that was dawning upon her. ‘*QOh, I’ll make you useful, never fear,” said Mrs. Hopwith. ‘You can keep accounts ?” Ohi ives.’ ‘And use the needle ?” ‘<'To be sure. ” ‘Then you can help me with the housekeeping books, and the linen, and the preserve jars, and half a hundred other things, until so be as you find a situation to your mind.” So Gratia Kempfield became, for the time being, a sort of lieutenant to the housekeeper at Melworth Hall. Upon rainy days Gratia amused herself by wandering through the great corridors and show-rooms of the Hall. She scarcely ever met any one, and when she did, was never addressed ; but there were times when the sound of gay voices and merry laughter in the inhabited regions of the Hall gave her a home- sick sensation ; and then it seemed to her as if she would gladly give ten years of her life-time to be once more on the shores of her native land. About Hugo Falconer she had made up her mind. Had he really cared to see her he would have repeated his visit to the White Hart Inn at Cheyne Regis. She knew his determined disposition too well to believe that he would abandon any pur- pose that really lay near his heart, after one, or even two repulses. ‘‘He has ceased to care for me,” she thought, with a chill sensation at her heart. ‘‘I knew that, on second thoughts, he would shrink from me, Yet that one kind look, that cordial grasp of the hand—oh, they make /Azs cruel neglect all -the harder to bear !” Mrs. Hopwith had told her that she thought she could easily obtain for her Colonel Falconer’s address from one of the Eomicbooks: co