put her foot down with a will, at every step.

"I was put here to be Desire Ledwith," she said, relentlessly, to
herself; "not Rosamond Holabird, nor even Dolly. Well, I suppose I
can stay put, and _be_! If things would only _let_ me be!"

But they will not. Things never do, Desire.

They are coming, now, upon you. Hard things,--and all at once.

XVIII.

ALL AT ONCE.

There was a Monday morning train going down from Z----.

Mr. Ledwith and Kenneth Kincaid were in it, reading the morning
papers, seated side by side.

It was nearly a week since the picnic, but the engagement of
Rosamond and Kenneth had not transpired. Mr. Holabird had been away
in New York. Of course nothing was said beyond Mrs. Holabird and
Ruth and Dolly Kincaid, until his return. But Kenneth carried a
happy face about with him, in the streets and in the cars and about
his work; and his speech was quick and bright with the men he met
and had need to speak to. It almost told itself; people might have
guessed it, if they had happened, at least to see the _two_ faces in
the same day, and if they were alive to sympathetic impressions of
other people's pain or joy. There are not many who stop to piece
expressions, from pure sympathy, however; they are, for the most
part, too busy putting this and that together for themselves.

Desire would have guessed it in a minute; but she saw little of
either in this week. Mrs. Ledwith was not well, and there was a
dress to be made for Helena.

Kenneth Kincaid's elder men friends said of him, when they saw him
in these days, "That's a fine fellow; he is doing very well." They
could read that; he carried it in his eye and in his tone and in his
step, and it was true.

It was a hot morning; it would be a stifling day in the city. They
sat quiet while they could, in the cars, taking the fresh air of the
fields and the sea reaches, reading the French news, and saying
little.

They came almost in to the city terminus, when the train stopped.
Not at a station. There were people to alight at the last but one;
these grew impatient after a few minutes, and got out and walked.

The train still waited.

Mr. Ledwith finished a column he was reading, and then looked up, as
the conductor came along the passage.

"What is the delay?" he asked of him.

"Freight. Got such a lot of it. Takes a good while to handle."

Freight outward bound. A train making up.

Mr. Ledwith turned to his newspaper again.

Te