tha, so
she ranged herself entirely without obtrusiveness on the side of the
Osborns.

"It's true that she's a good sort," Hester said when they went away.
"Her days of being hard up are not far enough away to be forgotten. She
hasn't any affectation, at any rate. It makes it easier to stand her."

"She looks like a strong woman," said Osborn. "Walderhurst got a good
deal for his money. She'll make a strapping British matron."

Hester winced and a dusky red shot up in her cheek. "So she will," she
sighed.

It was quite true, and the truer it was the worse for people who
despairingly hung on and were foolish enough to hope against hope.

Chapter Eight

The marriage of Lady Agatha came first, and was a sort of pageant. The
female writers for fashion papers lived upon it for weeks before it
occurred and for some time after. There were numberless things to be
written about it. Each flower of the garden of girls was to be
described, with her bridesmaid's dress, and the exquisite skin and eyes
and hair which would stamp her as the beauty of her season when she came
out. There yet remained five beauties in Lady Claraway's possession, and
the fifth was a baby thing of six, who ravished all beholders as she
toddled into church carrying her sister's train, aided by a little boy
page in white velvet and point lace.

The wedding was the most radiant of the year. It was indeed a fairy
pageant, of youth and beauty, and happiness and hope.

One of the most interesting features of the occasion was the presence of
the future Marchioness of Walderhurst, "the beautiful Miss Fox-Seton."
The fashion papers were very strenuous on the subject of Emily's beauty.
One of them mentioned that the height and pose of her majestic figure
and the cut of her profile suggested the Venus of Milo. Jane Cupp cut
out every paragraph she could find and, after reading them aloud to her
young man, sent them in a large envelope to Chichester. Emily,
faithfully endeavouring to adjust herself to the demands of her
approaching magnificence, was several times alarmed by descriptions of
her charms and accomplishments which she came upon accidentally in the
course of her reading of various periodicals.

The Walderhurst wedding was dignified and distinguished, but not
radiant. The emotions Emily passed through during the day--from her
awakening almost at dawn to the silence of her bedroom at South Audley
Street, until evening closed in upon her sitt