"You--mean--you won't?" Mrs. Bathurst said again very slowly.

"I will not." The white lips spoke the words, and closed upon them. Dinah
sat rigid with apprehension.

Mrs. Bathurst took her hand from her shoulder and turned from her. The
candle that had been burning all the evening was low in its socket. She
lifted it out and went to the fireplace. There were some shavings in the
grate. She pushed the lighted candle end in among them; then, as the fire
roared up the chimney, she turned.

An open trunk was close to her with the dainty pale green dress that
Dinah had worn the previous evening lying on the top. She took it up, and
bundled the soft folds together. Then violently she flung it on to the
flames.

Dinah gave a cry of dismay, and started to her feet. "Mother! What are
you doing? Mother! Are you mad?"

Mrs. Bathurst looked at her with eyes of blazing vindictiveness. "If you
are not going to be married, you won't need a trousseau," she said
grimly. "These things are quite unfit for a girl in your station. For
Lady Studley they would of course have been suitable, but not for such as
you."

She turned back to the open trunk with the words, and began to sweep
together every article of clothing it contained. Dinah watched her in
horror-stricken silence. She remembered with odd irrelevance how once in
her childhood for some petty offence her mother had burnt a favourite
doll, and then had whipped her soundly for crying over her loss.

She did not cry now. Her tears seemed frozen. She did not feel as if she
could ever cry again. The cold that enwrapped her was beginning to reach
her heart. She thought she was getting past all feeling.

So in mute despair she watched the sacrifice of all that Isabel's loving
care had provided. So much thought had been spent upon the delicate
finery. They had discussed and settled each dainty garment together. She
had revelled in the thought of all the good things which she was to
wear--she who had never worn anything that was beautiful before. And
now--and now--they shrivelled in the roaring flame and dropped into grey
ash in the fender.

It was over at last. Only the wedding-dress remained. But as Mrs.
Bathurst laid merciless hands upon this also, Dinah uttered a bitter cry.

"Oh, not that! Not that!"

Her mother paused. "Will you wear it to-morrow if Sir Eustace will have
you?" she demanded.

"No! Oh no!" Dinah tottered back against her bed and covered her eyes.

She c