ou are going to leave us, Miss Cornelia?
Why, you've only just come! I thought it was to be three months, at the
least. You're never going so soon?"

"Only for a few days. I'll be back again, to plague you, by the end of
next week. Don't you want me to go, Mury?"

Mary shook her head vigourously.

"I'd like to keep you for ever! The house isn't the same place since
you came. I was saying to my friend only last Sunday that I couldn't a
bear to think of you leaving. Couldn't you find a nice young gentleman,
and settle down in England for good? I'd come and live with you! I
wouldn't ask anything better than to live with you all my days."

"Mury, Mury! what about the friend? What would he say to such
desertion?"

Mary's grimace expressed a lively disregard of the friend's sufferings.

"I don't know how it is, but I think a heap more of you nor I do of
him," she confessed candidly. "I'd come fast enough, if you gave me the
chance. There's lots of good-looking young gentlemen in England, Miss
Cornelia!"

"Is that so? I hope I'll meet quite a number of them, then; but I
couldn't settle down out of my own country, Mury! You'll hev to cross
the ocean if you want to tend my house. We'll speak about that another
day; just now we've got to hustle round and get my clothes packed in the
next hef hour. Just the dandiest things I've got. I'm going to have a
real gay time in a hotel in London, Mury, with some friends from home,
so I must be as smart as I know how. ... Get out the big dress basket,
and we'll hold a Selection Committee right here on the bed."

Mary set to work, unable, despite depression, to restrain her interest
in the work on hand. The big boxes were dragged into the middle of the
room; bed, chairs, and sofas were strewn with garments, until the room
presented the appearance of a general drapery establishment. Cornelia
selected and directed, Mary carefully folded up skirts, and laid them in
the long shallow shelves. In the height of the confusion the door
opened, and Miss Briskett entered with hasty step. Signs of agitation
were visible on her features, an agitation which was increased by the
sight of the dishevelled room. In a lightning glance she took in the
half-filled trunks, the trim travelling costume spread over the chair by
the dressing-table, and a gleam of something strangely like fear shone
out of the cold grey eyes. Cornelia had no difficulty in understanding
that look. Aunt