A Sweet Girl Graduate by L.T. Meade

A thick mist lay over everything. Christmas had come and gone, and Priscilla's trunk was packed once more- Aunt Raby's old-world jacket between folds of tissue-paper, lying on the top of other homely garments.

The little sisters were in bed and asleep and Aunt Raby lay on the sofa. Prissie was accustomed to her face now, so she did not turn it away from the light. The white lips, the chalky gray tint under the eyes, the deep furrows round the sunken temples were all familiar to the younger "Miss Peel. " She had fitted once more into the old sordid life. She saw Hattie in her slipshod feet and Katie and Rose in their thin winter jackets, which did not half keep out the cold. She saw and partook of the scanty meals and tried to keep warm by the wretched fires. Once more she was part and parcel of the household. The children were so accustomed to her that they forgot she was going away again.