* * * *



And now it is indeed all over! They have come back from the
church--Tita just as she is every day, without a cloud on her brow,
and laughing with everybody, and telling everybody, without the
least disguisement, that she is so _glad_ she is married, because
now Uncle George can never claim her again. She seems to have no
thought but this. She treats her newly-made husband in a merry,
perfectly unembarrassed, rather _boyish_ style, and is, in effect,
quite delighted with her new move.

Sir Maurice has gone through it all without a flaw. At the breakfast
he had made quite a finished little speech (he could never have told
you afterwards what it was about), and when the bride was upstairs
changing her wedding garments he had gone about amongst his guests
with an air that left nothing to be desired. He looks quite an ideal
bridegroom. A mad longing for solitude drags him presently, however,
into a small anteroom, opening off a larger room beyond. The
carriage that is to convey him to the station is at the door, and he
almost swears at the delay that arises from Tita's non-appearance.

Yet here--here is rest. Here there is no one to breathe detestable
congratulations into his ear--_no_ one.

A tall, slight figure rises from a couch that is half hidden by a
Chinese screen. She comes forward a step or two. Her face is pale.
It is Marian Bethune.