ll like Edith--and we're not like our mothers! We want to live! And we
have a right to! Why don't you go? Can't you see I'm nearly crazy? It's my
last night, my very last! I don't want to talk to you--I don't even know
what I'm saying! And you come and try to frighten me!" Her voice caught
and broke into sobs. "You know nothing about me! You never did! Leave me
alone, can't you--leave me alone!"

"Father?" He heard Deborah's voice, abrupt and stern, outside the door.

"I'm sorry," he said hoarsely. He went in blind fashion out of the room and
down to his study. He lit a cigar and smoked wretchedly there. When
presently Deborah appeared he saw that her face was set and hard; but as
she caught the baffled look, the angry tortured light in his eyes, her own
expression softened.

"Poor father," she said, in a pitying way. "If Edith had only let you
alone."

"I certainly didn't do much good."

"Of course you didn't--you did harm--oh, so much more harm than you know."
Into the quiet voice of his daughter crept a note of keen regret. "I wanted
to make her last days in this house a time she could look back on, so that
she'd want to come home for help if ever she's in trouble. She has so
little--don't you see?--of what a woman needs these days. She has grown up
so badly. Oh, if you'd only let her alone. It was such a bad, bad time to
choose." She went to her father and kissed him. "Well, it's over now," she
said, "and we'll make the best we can of it. I'll tell her you're sorry and
quiet her down. And to-morrow we'll try to forget it has happened."

* * * * *

For Roger the morrow went by in a whirl. The wedding, a large church
affair, was to take place at twelve o'clock. He arose early, put on his
Prince Albert, went down and ate his breakfast alone. The waitress was
flustered, the coffee was burnt. He finished and anxiously wandered about.
The maids were bustling in and out, with Deborah giving orders pellmell.
The caterers came trooping in. The bridesmaids were arriving and hurrying
up to Roger's room. That place was soon a chaos of voices, giggles, peals
of laughter. Laura's trunks were brought downstairs, and Roger tagged them
for the ship, one for the cabin and three for the hold, and saw them into
the wagon. Then he strode distractedly everywhere, till at last he was
hustled by Deborah into a taxi waiting outside.

"It's all going so smoothly," Deborah said, and a faint sardonic glimm