threw all
paler beauties in the shade. The cabbage-rose is a vulgar flower
perhaps, but she is queen of the garden notwithstanding.

Lest it should be supposed, after this, that Vixen was a giantess, it
may be as well to state that her height was five feet six, her waist
twenty-two inches at most, her shoulders broad but finely sloping, her
arms full and somewhat muscular, her hands not small, but exquisitely
tapering, her foot long and narrow, her instep arched like an Arab's,
and all her movements instinct with an untutored grace and dignity. She
held her head higher than is common to women, and on that score was
found guilty of pride.

"I think we ought to go back before Christmas, Violet," said Mrs.
Tempest, continuing a discussion that had been dragging itself slowly
along for the last half-hour.

"I am ready, mamma," answered Vixen submissively. "It will break our
hearts afresh when we go home, but I suppose we must go home some day."

"But you would like to see the dear old house again, surely, Violet?"

"Like to see the frame without the picture? No, no, no, mamma. The
frame was very dear while the picture was in it--but--yes," cried Vixen
passionately, "I should like to go back. I should like to see papa's
grave, and carry fresh flowers there every day. It has been too much
neglected."

"Neglected, Violet! How can you say such thing? When Manotti's bill for
the monument was over nine hundred pounds."

"Oh, mamma, there is more love in a bunch of primroses that my own hand
gathers and carries to the grave than in all the marble or granite in
Westminster Abbey."

"My dear, for poor people wild flowers are very nice, and show good
feeling--but the rich must have monuments. There could be nothing too
splendid for your dear papa," added the widow tearfully.

She was always tearful when she spoke of her dear Edward, even now;
though she was beginning to find that life had some savour without him.

"No," said Vixen, "but I think papa will like the flowers best."

"Then if all is well, Miss McCroke," pursued Mrs. Tempest, "we will go
back at the end of November. It would be a pity to lose the season
here."

Vixen yawned despondently.

"What do we care about the season, mamma?" she exclaimed. "Can it
matter to us whether there are two or three thousand extra people in
the place? It only makes the King's Road a little more uncomfortable."

"My dear Violet, at your age gaiety is good for you," said Mrs. T