ence over and over, so
as to remember it.) I know that she went on to say that by and by the
tarnish began to dim the brightness of my life, too; and that was the
worst of all, she said--that innocent children should suffer, and
their young lives be spotted by the kind of living I'd had to have,
with this wretched makeshift of a divided home. She began to cry again
then, and begged me to forgive her, and I cried and tried to tell her
I didn't mind it; but, of course, I'm older now, and I know I do mind
it, though I'm trying just as hard as I can not to be Mary when I
ought to be Marie, or Marie when I ought to be Mary. Only I get all
mixed up so, lately, and I said so, and I guess I cried some more.

Mother jumped up then, and said, "Tut, tut," what was she thinking of
to talk like this when it couldn't do a bit of good, but only made
matters worse. And she said that only went to prove how she was still
keeping on tarnishing my happiness and bringing tears to my bright
eyes, when certainly nothing of the whole wretched business was my
fault.

She thrust the dress back into the trunk then, and shut the lid. Then
she took me downstairs and bathed my eyes and face with cold water,
and hers, too. And _she_ began to talk and laugh and tell stories, and
be gayer and jollier than I'd seen her for ever so long. And she was
that way at dinner, too, until Grandfather happened to mention the
reception to-morrow night, and ask if she was going.

She flushed up red then, oh, so red! and said, "Certainly not." Then
she added quick, with a funny little drawing-in of her breath, that
she should let Marie go, though, with her Aunt Hattie.

There was an awful fuss then. Aunt Hattie raised her eyebrows and
threw up her hands, and said:

"That child--in the evening! Why, Madge, are you crazy?"

And Mother said no, she wasn't crazy at all; but it was the only
chance Father would have to see me, and she didn't feel that she had
any right to deprive him of that privilege, and she didn't think it
would do me any harm to be out this once late in the evening. And she
intended to let me go.

Aunt Hattie still didn't approve, and she said more, quite a lot more;
but Grandfather spoke up and took my part, and said that, in his
opinion, Madge was right, quite right, and that it was no more than
fair that the man should have a chance to talk with his own child for
a little while, and that he would be very glad to take me himself and
look aft