of fifteen and a half years upon these newly acquired
habits, proved a source of some vexation to the widow; and, love
Leonetta as she might, she very quickly discovered that the peace of
mind and freedom of action that Cleopatra had allowed her unstintingly
were to be despotically withheld by her younger and more exacting
offspring.

Cleopatra watched and understood all this. It seemed that Mrs. Delarayne
and Leonetta were inevitably heading towards a catastrophe; nor did the
elder girl take any steps, either by word or deed, to guide either of
them to a peaceable adjustment of their differences.

Gradually Leonetta grew to be deliberately rude with her parent, would
refuse to fetch and carry for her, was quickly bored over any little
personal service performed for her, and did her best in every way to
cramp the widow's ever freshly sprouting affection.

At last Cleopatra felt she must put in a word. Her mother was very
highly strung, in any case too much so to be exposed constantly to
irritation and sorrow. Could she help? Could she speak to Baby?

It was then that Mrs. Delarayne had opened her heart to Cleopatra. No,
she had made up her mind. Reluctantly she had been forced to the
conclusion that Leonetta must go away,--to a school of domesticity, or
of gardening or something,--where she could acquire not only
information, but also the discipline which would save her from growing
up an impossible woman.

Cleopatra had given vent to a sigh of relief, and with decent slowness
and hesitation had ultimately agreed.

A somewhat acrimonious quarrel between Mrs. Delarayne and Leonetta, a
day or two after this conversation had taken place, proved to be the
determining factor. In her passion Leonetta had declared that she would
be as glad as anything to go, if only for company, as it seemed to her
that her mother was eternally "gadding about"; and it was only when she
was alone in a first-class carriage travelling northward that she
regretted this hasty and ill-considered speech.

Another year had passed in this way; Leonetta had by now become,
according to the domesticity school reports, an accomplished
housekeeper, and, as a girl of seventeen, was on her way home. Coming
home!--Cleopatra had dwelt on this homecoming every wakeful hour of the
last thirty days, and again she felt that pang, or pain, or strange
convulsion of the heart, which she loathed because it humiliated her,
and which she combated because it threa