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am obliged to you, sir. Indeed, the circumstancescould hardly be more propitious. I caution, as always, against the slightest complacency on our part, but I am perfectly easy in my own mind. I do not think my Lady will be troubling us again.’

Chapter Three
Hester’s Narrative
    I have a great deal of difficulty in beginning to write my portion of these pages, for I know I am not clever. I always knew that. Even when I was a very little girl I knew, and I would confess it to my doll when we were alone together, and ask her to be kind and patient with me. And she would sit there in her little chair, with her bright smile, and bright pink cheeks, and I would sit by her and chatter on, telling her all my childish secrets, and knowing she would understand and never blame me. I would run up to my room as soon as I came home from school, and tell her all that I had done, and all that I had said, in that great expanse of hours since I had left her there that morning. Though I rarely had much to tell of what I had said, because I never said very much at all. I was always a very diffident child, very shy, and fearful of putting myself forward, though perhaps I had, in consequence, a rather observant way about me – not a clever way, or a quick way, no indeed! – but a quiet way of noticing things, and events, and people, especially when they are people that I love. Though it is possible that I flatter myself even in that.
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    The first person I loved so tenderly as this was my mother. My earliest memory is of our tiny up-and-down cottage with a trellis of honeysuckle around the door, and a pretty little gardenwhere cherry trees would blossom in spring, and snowdrops nestle among the snow in the winter of the year. Though when I think of this little house now, it is always summer, the sky blue and the view of the meadows hazy in the heat, and a sweet warm breeze. I would sit in the sunshine on the tiny veranda, playing with my dear old Dolly, while my mother sat in her own chair at the little tea-table, with its white cloth and its delicate china pot, all wreathed with jasmine and roses.
    My mother was, I think, the prettiest lady I ever saw, with her beautiful golden curls and the loveliest eyes in her gentle tender face. People have told me since that I resemble her, and sometimes I catch a glimpse of myself in the glass and think I see my mother’s face. But even if I am not so pretty as she was, I remember that the gentlemen who visited us in our little house were always quick to praise my looks. When I was still a very little girl, one of these gentleman – tall and severe to my lowly eye – bent down and touched my shoulder, saying, ‘Do you know how pretty you are, child?’, smiling all the while at my mother, where she sat at her needlework before the fire, and the little bird sang in its cage above her head.
    I had a very happy childhood altogether, surrounded by my mother’s love, and the companionship of the girls at the local school. I was the smallest there by a good deal, and they all made such a pet of me, kissing and cosseting me, and calling me their little marmoset. My mother shook her head at these frivolities, saying she was afraid I would be spoiled by so much attention. I think this was why she discouraged me from inviting my friends home; at least I think that must be the explanation, for I cannot remember any parties at the cottage in those days. Or not, at least, for my own friends; aside from the gentlemen who visited my mother, our lives were very retired and tranquil. As I grew older, my mother was careful to instruct me in myduties and obligations, telling me to be always diligent, submissive, and obedient. “Do good to those around you, child,” she said one day, as I stood at her bedside, “and you will always win their love. That is all that matters. Nothing else. You must always remember that.” The tears come to my eyes when I think of her