ut now she had
found a new avenue for her activities. She would produce a great song
one day, something that would make the world better and that would
command Charles Stuart's approbation, no matter how unwilling he was to
give it. Accordingly she made a bolder flight into the realm of poesy,
and sent this second venture to the _Dominion_. To her dismay it was
promptly sent back without a remark. A third and fourth effort to gain
an entrance to lesser publications, ending in failure, convinced her
that once more she had made a mistake. The Pretender was right, she
had not the divine fire. She tried prose next, but she could not weave
a story had her life depended upon it, and as for those clever articles
other women wrote, she did not even understand what they were about.
No, she was a failure surely, she told herself. This little song was
like her acting on the school stage in the old days at home. She had
promised to be a star and had suddenly set in oblivion.

She gave up literature entirely, and once more that old imperative
question, of what use was she to be in the world, faced her. She might
have found opportunities in plenty in St. Stephen's Church, but the
only young ladies she knew in the congregation belonged to the select
Guild of which Miss Kendall was a member, and since her encounter with
that lady Elizabeth had wisely avoided her. Besides, she felt that
John and Charles Stuart would surely disown her if she were caught
connecting herself with that society.

But the opportunities for self-examination and consequent
self-dissatisfaction grew fewer as the winter advanced. Luncheons,
receptions, bridge tournaments, and theater parties followed each other
with such bewildering swiftness that Elizabeth seldom had time for
serious thought. So busy was she that often a week flew past without
an opportunity even to run over to No. 15, much to the satisfaction of
Mrs. Jarvis, who was often jealous of its attractions.

There was a new reason, too, for Elizabeth's many engagements, other
than her popularity. Ever since the evening early in the autumn when
Mr. Huntley had recognized his little Queen Elizabeth of the Forest
Glen woods, he had been paying her marked attentions. He was a wealthy
man now, one of the city's most prominent lawyers, a large shareholder
in one of the new and most promising railroads, and--as Mrs. Jarvis
joyfully pointed out to Elizabeth at every opportunity--the best match