always wondering what you would have
been like. I think you will not disappoint her. You have been in a
trying position for a girl of your ambition and temperament. I think you
might have accepted some proffers without much hurt to your pride, but
you know now you are on an equality with the best, and though many of
these distinctions are much to be regretted, we cannot change the world.
The change must be in ourselves, the grace and kindliness that shapes
the character to finer and higher issues. But if you had been Mrs.
Boyd's daughter, I think there would have been a very promising future
before you. I know you would have tried your utmost to succeed in the
two lines I have indicated; and now they will be accomplishments. Mrs.
Crawford was a fine linguist and has brightened many an hour with
intellectual pursuits. I am more than glad that you will be so
companionable, but I cannot give up my interest in you, and I want you
to feel that you will be, in part, a daughter to me."

Lilian bent her head down on Mrs. Barrington's shoulder and cried
softly, touched to the inmost heart by the affection she had hardly
dreamed she had won.

"There are no quite perfect lives even if there is a great deal of
love," the lady continued. "We learn to limit our wants and expectations
by what others have to give us, and it is by loving that we learn to
live truly, though many shrines get despoiled of ideals as we go along
in youth; but as we retrace our steps with years and experience we find
God has put something better in them. I want you to come to me with any
difficulty that can be confided outside of the family circle. But your
mother must be your best friend; and now, dear, good-night."

Lilian returned the kiss, but her heart was too full for words. Tomorrow
she would belong somewhere else, have new duties. Oh, could she take
them up in the right spirit?

CHAPTER XV

YOUR TRUE HOME

Marguerite Crawford felt that she had been truly changed to some other
personality when the carriage stopped under the broad _porte cochere_,
and the driver opened the door with a bow for his master. There had been
a slight fall of snow in the night that had wrapped every post and every
tree in a mantle of jewels, and now the sun came out gorgeously, sending
golden rays over the dappled sky of blue and white.

Her father handed her out. Willard ran down the wide steps taking both
her hands in his and kissing her fondly. A passion of r