h is raging around them. In the present instance, two people
who were keenly interested in coming events were in this position. One
of them was Mrs. Meadowsweet, the other, Mrs. Bertram. The time would
come when Beatrice would confide in her mother, but that moment had not
yet arrived. The old lady wondered why she had so many visitors, and why
people looked at her in a curious, pitying sort of fashion. Why also
they invariably spoke of Beatrice as "poor dear," and inquired with
tender solicitude for her health.

"Brides usedn't to be 'poor deared' in my day," the old lady remarked
rather testily to her handmaiden, Jane. "Any one would suppose Beatrice
was going to have an illness instead of a wedding from the way folks
talk of her."

"Eh, well, ma'am," Jane replied.

Jane's "eh, well, ma'am" was as full of suppressed meaning as a balloon
is full of air. She heaved a prodigious sigh as she spoke, for of course
she had heard the gossip, and had indeed come to blows with a Hartite
that very morning.

"Eh, dear!" said Jane. "Rumor's a queer thing."

She did not vouchsafe any more, and Mrs. Meadowsweet was too innocent
and indolent and comfortable in her mind to question her.

The other person who knew nothing was Mrs. Bertram. Of all the people in
the world Mrs. Bertram was perhaps the most interested in that wedding
which was to take place on Tuesday. The wedding could scarcely mean more
to the bride and bridegroom than it did to her--yet no news of any
_contretemps_, of any little hitch in the all-important proceedings,
had reached her ears. For the last week she had taken steps to keep
Catherine and Mabel apart from all Northbury gossip. The servants at the
Manor who, of course knew everything did not dare to breathe a syllable
of their conjectures. The bravest Hartite and Beatricite would not have
dared to intrude their budgets of wild conjecture on Mrs. Bertram's
ears. Consequently she lived through these exciting days in comparative
calm. Soon the great tension would be over. Soon her gravest alarms
would be lulled to rest, Now and then she wondered that Beatrice was not
oftener at the Manor. Now and then she exclaimed with some vexation at
Mr. Ingram's extraordinary absence from home at such a time.

The Rector had gone to London, and a stranger took his pulpit on that
all-important Sunday before the wedding.

Mrs. Bertram wondered a little over these two points, but they did not
greatly disturb her;--Loftu