peaches; in parties where the table groaned, the servants also, and in
the looking well after the ways of her household. But of a child's heart
and imagination she knew little. She was a true woman, but a housekeeper
had taken her place, and neither her father nor herself had been
seriously affected by her death.

And what splendid comrades she and her father were after her mother
left them! He would let no one teach her but himself, and how he loved
to show her off to his friends, putting her on top of the dining-room
table and making her recite in Latin bits from an ode of Horace, in
French a fable of La Fontaine's, in English a sonnet of Shelley or
extracts from Shakespeare's plays, and then letting her dance the
heel-and-toe shuffle taught her secretly by the darkies on the place.
What a selfish little pig she had been allowed to be! How selfish both
of them had been! Their books a passion, travel their delight, most
people but persons who bored or bothered, they had lived largely apart,
come and gone as they chose, cared little for what others said or
thought; and yet when the war came they were back, passionate defenders
of their cause, and in their hearts hot hate for those who sought to
crush it.

And then it was pride measured its lance with love, and won. The
awakening of her womanhood and the mockery of life had come
together, hand in hand, and henceforth she was another creature.

In her chair Miss Gibbie shivered. It was not the sudden gust of wind
that caused the sudden chill, but the scent of the micrafella roses just
under the window which the wind had brought; and her arms,
interlocked, were pressed closer to her breast. "Gibbie Gault, what a
fool you are!" she said, under her breath. "But how much bigger a fool