the play over, Eugenia?" asked Felix.

She gave him a sharp glance. "I have spoken my part."

"With great applause!" said her brother.

"Oh, applause--applause!" she murmured. And she gathered up two or three
of her dispersed draperies. She glanced at the beautiful brocade, and
then, "I don't see how I can have endured it!" she said.

"Endure it a little longer. Come to my wedding."

"Thank you; that 's your affair. My affairs are elsewhere."

"Where are you going?"

"To Germany--by the first ship."

"You have decided not to marry Mr. Acton?"

"I have refused him," said Eugenia.

Her brother looked at her in silence. "I am sorry," he rejoined at last.
"But I was very discreet, as you asked me to be. I said nothing."

"Please continue, then, not to allude to the matter," said Eugenia.

Felix inclined himself gravely. "You shall be obeyed. But your position
in Germany?" he pursued.

"Please to make no observations upon it."

"I was only going to say that I supposed it was altered."

"You are mistaken."

"But I thought you had signed"--

"I have not signed!" said the Baroness.

Felix urged her no further, and it was arranged that he should
immediately assist her to embark.

Mr. Brand was indeed, it appeared, very impatient to consummate his
sacrifice and deliver the nuptial benediction which would set it off so
handsomely; but Eugenia's impatience to withdraw from a country in which
she had not found the fortune she had come to seek was even less to be
mistaken. It is true she had not made any very various exertion; but
she appeared to feel justified in generalizing--in deciding that the
conditions of action on this provincial continent were not favorable
to really superior women. The elder world was, after all, their natural
field. The unembarrassed directness with which she proceeded to
apply these intelligent conclusions appeared to the little circle of
spectators who have figured in our narrative but the supreme exhibition
of a character to which the experience of life had imparted an
inimitable pliancy. It had a distinct effect upon Robert Acton, who, for
the two days preceding her departure, was a very restless and irritated
mortal. She passed her last evening at her uncle's, where she had never
been more charming; and in parting with Clifford Wentworth's affianced
bride she drew from her own finger a curious old ring and presented it
to her with the prettiest speech and kiss. Gertrude, who as