eyes.

"Oh, Howard, I must seem to you very ungrateful," she cried. "It was
such a--such a surprise. I have never lived in the country, and I'm sure
it will be delightful--and much more healthful than the city. Won't you
forgive me?"

If he had known as much about the fluctuations of the feminine
temperament as of those of stocks, the ease with which Honora executed
this complete change of front might have disturbed him. Howard, as will
be seen, possessed that quality which is loosely called good nature.
In marriage, he had been told (and was ready to believe), the wind blew
where it listed; and he was a wise husband who did not spend his time in
inquiry as to its sources. He kissed her before he helped her out of the
carriage. Again they crossed the North River, and he led her through the
wooden ferry house on the New Jersey side to where the Rivington train
was standing beside a platform shed.

There was no parlour car. Men and women--mostly women--with bundles
were already appropriating the seats and racks, and Honora found herself
wondering how many of these individuals were her future neighbours. That
there might have been an hysterical element in the lively anticipation
she exhibited during the journey did not occur to Howard Spence.

After many stops,--in forty-two minutes, to be exact, the brakeman
shouted out the name of the place which was to be her home, and of which
she had been ignorant that morning. They alighted at an old red railroad
station, were seized upon by a hackman in a coonskin coat, and thrust
into a carriage that threatened to fall to pieces on the frozen macadam
road. They passed through a village in which Honora had a glimpse of
the drug store and grocery and the Grand Army Hall; then came detached
houses of all ages in one and two-acre plots some above the road, for
the country was rolling; a very attractive church of cream-coloured
stone, and finally the carriage turned sharply to the left under an
archway on which were the words "Stafford Park," and stopped at a very
new curbstone in a very new gutter on the right.

"Here we are!" cried Howard, as he fished in his trousers pockets for
money to pay the hackman.

Honora looked around her. Stafford Park consisted of a wide centre-way
of red gravel, not yet packed, with an island in its middle planted with
shrubbery and young trees, the bare branches of which formed a black
tracery against the orange-red of the western sky. On both side