was a certain thing Emily found herself continually saying. It
used to break from her lips when she was alone in her room, when she was
on her way to her dressmaker's, and in spite of herself, sometimes when
she was with her whilom patroness.

"I can't believe it is true! I can't believe it!"

"I don't wonder, my dear girl," Lady Maria answered the second time she
heard it. "But what circumstances demand of you is that you should learn
to."

"Yes," said Emily, "I know I must. But it seems like a dream.
Sometimes," passing her hand over her forehead with a little laugh, "I
feel as if I should suddenly find myself wakened in the room in Mortimer
Street by Jane Cupp bringing in my morning tea. And I can see the
wallpaper and the Turkey-red cotton curtains. One of them was an inch or
so too short. I never could afford to buy the new bit, though I always
intended to."

"How much was the stuff a yard?" Lady Maria inquired.

"Sevenpence."

"How many yards did you need?"

"Two. It would have cost one and twopence, you see. And I really could
get on without it."

Lady Maria put up her lorgnette and looked at her protegee with an
interest which bordered on affection, it was so enjoyable to her
epicurean old mind.

"I didn't suspect it was as bad as that, Emily," she said. "I should
never have dreamed it. You managed to do yourself with such astonishing
decency. You were actually nice--always."

"I was very much poorer than anyone knew," said Emily. "People don't
like one's troubles. And when one is earning one's living as I was, one
must be agreeable, you know. It would never do to seem tiresome."

"There's cleverness in realising that fact," said Lady Maria. "You were
always the most cheerful creature. That was one of the reasons
Walderhurst admired you."

The future marchioness blushed all over. Lady Maria saw even her neck
itself blush, and it amused her ladyship greatly. She was intensely
edified by the fact that Emily could be made to blush by the mere
mention of her mature fiance's name.

"She's in such a state of mind about the man that she's delightful," was
the old woman's internal reflection; "I believe she's in love with him,
as if she was a nurse-maid and he was a butcher's boy."

"You see," Emily went on in her nice, confiding way (one of the most
surprising privileges of her new position was that it made it possible
for her to confide in old Lady Maria), "it was not only the living from
day to da