nd sudden twitchings of the face and abrupt movements of the
limbs. And, keenly alive to what was passing in her daughter's mind, she
insisted on Olive's accompanying her to the tennis-parties with which
the county teemed. Sir Charles, Mr. Adair, and even poor Sir Richard
were put forward as the most eligible of men.

'It is impossible to say when the big fish will be caught; it is often
the last try that brings him to land,' murmured Mrs. Barton. But Olive
had lost courage, and could fix her thoughts on no one. And, often when
they returned home, she would retire to her room to have a good cry.

'Leave me alone, Alice; oh, go away. Don't tease me, don't tease me! I
only want to be left alone.'

'But listen, dear; can I do anything for you?'

'You! no, no, indeed you can't. I only want to be left alone. I am so
miserable, so unhappy; I wish I were dead!'

'Dead?'

'Yes, dead; what's the use of living when I know that I shall be an old
maid? We shall all be old maids. What's the use of being pretty, either,
when Violet, though she be but a bag of bones, has got the Marquis? I
have been out two seasons now, and nothing has come of all the trying.
And yet I was the belle of the season, wasn't I, Alice?' And now,
looking more than ever like a cameo Niobe, Olive stared at her sister
piteously. 'Oh yes, Alice, I know I shall be an old maid; and isn't it
dreadful, and I the belle of the season? It makes me so unhappy. No one
ever heard of the belle (and I was the belle not of one, but of two
seasons) remaining an old maid. I can understand a lot of ugly things
not getting married, but I--'

Alice smiled, and half ironically she asked herself if Olive really
suffered. No heart-pang was reflected in those blue mindless eyes; there
was no heart to wound: only a little foolish vanity had been bruised.

'And to think,' cried this whimpering beauty, when Alice had seen her
successfully through a flood of hysterical tears, 'that I was silly
enough to give up dear Edward. I am punished for it now, indeed I am;
and it was very wicked of me--it was a great sin. I broke his heart. But
you know, Alice dear, that it was all mamma's fault; she urged me on;
and you know how I refused, how I resisted her. Didn't I resist--tell
me. You know, and why won't you say that I did resist?'

'You did, indeed, Olive; but you must not distress yourself, or you will
make yourself ill.'

'Yes, perhaps you are right, there's nothing makes one lo