r door.

"Well," said Madam grimly, pulling on her gloves, "it is a novel
experience to find a young person who has a respect for other people's
time."

CHAPTER 21

For the next two weeks Eleanor made a heroic effort to follow Quin's
advice and be nice to Madam. She wanted, with all her heart, to gain her
point peacefully, and she also wanted Quin's approval of what she was
doing. In spite of his obvious adoration, she frequently detected a note
of criticism in his voice, that, while it piqued her, also stirred her
conscience and made her see things in a new and disturbing light. For the
first time, she began to wonder if she could be partly to blame for the
friction that always existed between herself and her grandmother. She
certainly had taken an unholy joy in flaunting her Martel characteristics
in the old lady's face. It was not that she preferred to identify herself
with her mother's family rather than with her father's. The Martel
shiftlessness and visionary improvidence were quite as intolerable to her
as the iron-clad conventions of the Bartletts. She could take correction
from Aunt Isobel and Aunt Enid, but there was something in her
grandmother's caustic comments that made her tingle with instant
opposition, as a delicate vase will shiver at the sound of its own
vibration.

During the days before the wedding she surprised herself by her docility
and acquiescence in all that was proposed for her. She even accepted
without demur the white swiss and blue ribbons that a week before she had
considered entirely too infantile for an adult maid of honor. This
particular exhibition of virtue was due to the exemplary behavior of the
bride herself. Miss Enid had longed for the regulation white satin, tulle
veil, and orange blossoms; but Madam had promptly cited the case of the
old maid who waited so long to marry that her orange blossoms turned to
oranges.

Miss Enid was married in a sober traveling dress, and carried a
prayer-book. She and Mr. Chester stood in front of the drawing-room
mantel, where twenty years before Madam had expressed her opinion
concerning sentimental young fools who thought they could live on fifteen
dollars a week.

The budding romance, snatched ruthlessly up and flung into the dust-heap
of common sense, had lain dormant all these years, until Quinby Graham
had stumbled upon its dried old roots, and planted them once again in the
garden of dreams.