t over on short notice," Mr. Mencke replied,
looking exceedingly glum.

"You may rest satisfied upon one point; you will never have to surrender
it to that fellow," his wife returned, decisively. "I will send Violet
to a convent first, and she would be kept straight enough there."

"That is well thought of Belle," said her husband, eagerly, his usually
stolid face lighting up greedily. "It would never do, though, to send
her to one here; suppose we get her off to Montreal, where there will be
no one to interfere; we can keep her there as long as we like, and
meantime I will make Cincinnati too hot to hold that youngster."

"We will do it, Will, and she shall stay there until she promises to
give up this silly love affair."

"You are a very conscientious and affectionate sister, Belle," said her
husband, with a sarcastic laugh. "What do you suppose Eben Huntington
would say to----"

"Hush!" returned Mrs. Mencke, with an authoritative gesture, "that is a
secret that must never be breathed aloud; but all things are fair in
love and war, and to Montreal and into a convent Violet shall go without
delay."

But if Mrs. Mencke could have caught a glimpse of the white, resolute
face of her young sister, as she stood at that moment just outside the
drawing-room door, she might not have felt quite so confident of her
power to carry out her project.

Violet, after leaving Mrs. Mencke, intended to go at once to her room,
but upon reaching the top of the stairs, she remembered that she had
left upon the piano, in the library, Wallace's letter, in a book that
she had been reading.

Not wishing other eyes than her own to peruse it, she stole quietly down
again to get it, and happened to pass the drawing-room door just as her
sister made her threat to send her to a convent.

She had always had a horror of convent life, and though Mrs. Mencke had
been educated at one, Violet would never consent to go to one, and had
attended the public schools of the city, until she graduated from the
high school, after which she spent a year at a noted institution in
Columbus, "to finish off."

She was greatly agitated as she listened to the conversation of her two
guardians, and she wondered how they could scheme so against her. It was
cruel, heartless. There had never been open warfare between them before,
though Violet had not always been so happy as young girls usually are.
There was much about her home-life that was not congenial, but s