his, however, was not his word) was
only a question of days.

There was nothing left for Minola but to wait, and now accuse and now
try to justify herself. Many a time there came back to her mind the
three faces on the mausoleum in Keeton, the symbols of life, death, and
eternity; and she could not help wondering whether the mere passing
through the portal of death could all at once transfigure a cold,
narrow-minded, peevish, egotistical human creature into the soul of
lofty calmness and ineffable sweetness, all peace and love, which the
sculptor had set out in his illustration of humanity's closing state.

Meantime, she kept generally at home, except for her familiar walks in
the park and her now less frequent visits to the British Museum and to
South Kensington. Lucy Money, surprised at her absence, hunted her up,
to use Lucy's own expression, and declared that she was looking pale
and wretched, and that she must come over to Victoria street, and pass
a day or two there, for companionship and change. Mary Blanchet, too,
pressed Minola to go; and at last she consented, not unwilling to be
taken forcibly out of her self-inquisition and her anxieties for the
moment. She had made no other acquaintances, and seemed resolute not to
make any, but there was always something peculiarly friendly and genial
to her in the atmosphere of the Moneys' home. The whole family had been
singularly kind to her, and their kindness was absolutely
disinterested. Minola could not but love Mrs. Money, and could not but
be a little amused by her; and there was something very pleasing to her
in Mr. Money's strong common sense and blunt originality. Minola liked,
too, the curious little peeps at odd groupings of human life which she
could obtain by sitting for a few hours in Mrs. Money's drawing-room.
All the _schwaermerei_ of letters, politics, art, and social life seemed
to illustrate itself "in little" there.

Minola, when she accompanied Lucy to her home, was taken by the girl up
and down to this room and that to see various new things that had been
bought, and the two young women entered Mrs. Money's drawing-room a
little after the hour when she usually began to receive visitors. A
large lady, who spoke with a very deep voice, was seated in earnest
conversation with Mrs. Money.

"This is my darling, sweet Lucy, I perceive," the lady said in tones of
soft rolling thunder as the young women came in.

"Oh--Lady Limpenny!"

"Come here, ch