her attendants at her side made up sprays for
dances and wreaths for funerals from the same flowers.

And at last she felt herself urged to a course which, in her ordinary
mind, she would have shrunk from as a lowering of her personal dignity:
she would go and see her rival, and insist that this particular
humiliation should be spared her. The ring was not Leander's to dispose
of--at least, to dispose of thus; it was not right that any but herself
should wear it; and, though the token could never now be devoted to its
rightful use, she wanted to save it from what, in her eyes, was a kind
of profanation.

She would not own it to herself, but there was a motive stronger than
all this--the desire to relieve her breast of some of the indignation
which was choking her, and of which her pride forbade any betrayal to
Leander himself.

This other woman had supplanted her; but she should be made to feel the
wrong she had done, and her triumphs should be tempered with shame, if
she were capable of such a sensation. Matilda knew very well that the
ring was not hers, and she wanted it no longer; but, then, it was Miss
Tweddle's, and she would claim it in her name.

She easily obtained permission to leave somewhat earlier that evening,
as she did not often ask such favours, and soon found herself at Madame
Chenille's establishment, where she remembered to have heard from Bella
that her sister was employed.

She asked for the forewoman, and begged to be allowed to speak to Miss
Parkinson in private for a very few minutes; but the forewoman referred
her to the proprietress, who made objections: such a thing was never
permitted during business hours, the shop would close in an hour, till
then Miss Parkinson was engaged in the showroom, and so on.

But Matilda carried her point at last, and was shown to a room in the
basement, where the assistants took their meals, there to wait until
Miss Parkinson could be spared from her duties.

Matilda waited in the low, dingy room, where the tea-things were still
littering the table, and as she paced restlessly about, trying to feel
an interest in the long-discarded fashion-plates which adorned the
walls, her anger began to cool, and give place to something very like
nervousness.

She wished she had not come. What, after all, was she to say to this
girl when they met? And what was Leander--base and unworthy as he had
shown himself--to her any longer? Why should she care what he chose to