was happy and if
she wanted anything.

"Yes!" said Marcella, her large eyes gleaming; "tell mamma I want a
'fringe.' Every other girl in the school has got one."

And she pointed disdainfully to her plainly parted hair. Her father,
astonished by her unexpected vehemence, put up his eyeglass and studied
the child's appearance. Three days later, by her mother's permission,
Marcella was taken to the hairdresser at Marswell by Mademoiselle
Renier, returned in all the glories of a "fringe," and, in
acknowledgment thereof, wrote her mother a letter which for the first
time had something else than formal news in it.

Meanwhile new destinies were preparing for her. For a variety of small
reasons Mr. Boyce, who had never yet troubled himself about the matter
from a distance, was not, upon personal inspection, very favourably
struck with his daughter's surroundings. His wife remarked shortly, when
he complained to her, that Marcella seemed to her as well off as the
daughter of persons of their means could expect to be. But Mr. Boyce
stuck to his point. He had just learnt that Harold, the only son of his
widowed brother Robert, of Mellor Park, had recently developed a deadly
disease, which might be long, but must in the end be sure. If the young
man died and he outlived Robert, Mellor Park would be his; they would
and must return, in spite of certain obstacles, to their natural rank in
society, and Marcella must of course be produced as his daughter and
heiress. When his wife repulsed him, he went to his eldest sister, an
old maid with a small income of her own, who happened to be staying with
them, and was the only member of his family with whom he was now on
terms. She was struck with his remarks, which bore on family pride, a
commodity not always to be reckoned on in the Boyces, but which she
herself possessed in abundance; and when he paused she slowly said that
if an ideal school of another type could be found for Marcella, she
would be responsible for what it might cost over and above the present
arrangement. Marcella's manners were certainly rough; it was difficult
to say what she was learning, or with whom she was associating;
accomplishments she appeared to have none. Something should certainly be
done for her--considering the family contingencies. But being a strong
evangelical, the aunt stipulated for "religious influences," and said
she would write to a friend.

The result was that a month or two later Marcella, n