lly fascinating,--and we have
no right to say he is not good--and everybody knows he is going to be
great! Why shouldn't she be happy?"

"I don't know," answered Cary. "But I know she won't be."

"You say that," cried Unity, turning on him, "because you are a
Federalist! Well, women are neither Federalists nor Republicans! They
have no party and no soul of their own! They are just what the person
they love is--"

"That's not so," said Cary.

"Oh, I know it's not so!" agreed Miss Dandridge, with impatience. "It's
just one of those things that are said! But it remains that Jacqueline
must be happy. I'll break my heart if she's not! And as long as I live,
I'll say that Uncle Dick and Uncle Edward are to blame--"

"Where are they?"

"Oh, Uncle Dick is in the long field watching the threshing, and Uncle
Edward is in the library reading Swift! And Aunt Nancy has ordered black
scarfs to be put above the pictures of Uncle Henry and of Great-Aunt
Jacqueline that Jacqueline's named for. Oh, oh!"

"And Deb?" asked the young man gently.

"Deb is at Cousin Jane Selden's. She has been there with Jacqueline a
week--she and Miranda. Oh, I know--Uncle Dick is a just man! He does
what he thinks is the just thing. Deb shall go visit her sister--every
now and then! And all that Uncle Henry left Jacqueline goes with
her--there are slaves and furniture and plate, and she has money, too.
The Rands don't usually marry so well--There! I, too, am bitter! But
Uncle Dick swears that he will never see Jacqueline again--and all the
Churchills keep their word. Oh, family quarrels! Deb's coming back to
Fontenoy to-morrow--poor little chick! Aunt Nancy's got to have those
mourning scarfs taken away before she comes!"

Miss Dandridge descended the porch steps to the waiting coach. The
younger Cary handed her in with great care of her flowers and gauzy
draperies, and great reluctance in relinquishing her hand. "I may come
too?" he asked, "just as far as the old Greenwood road? I hate to see
you go alone."

"Oh, yes, yes!" answered Miss Dandridge absently, and, sinking into a
corner, regarded through the window the July morning. "Those black
scarfs hurt me," she said, and the July morning grew misty. "It's not
death to marry the man one loves!"

The coach rolled down the drive to the gate, and out upon the sunny
road. The dust rose in clouds, whitening the elder, the stickweed, and
the blackberry bushes. The locusts shrilled in the parching