o steady herself, making it all seem real, "I am being married.
This is my wedding. I am Emily Fox-Seton being married to the Marquis of
Walderhurst. For his sake I must not look stupid or excited. I am not in
a dream."

How often she said this after the ceremony was over and they returned to
South Audley Street, for the wedding breakfast could scarcely be
computed. When Lord Walderhurst helped her from the carriage and she
stepped on to the strip of red carpet and saw the crowd on each side of
it and the coachman and footmen with their big white wedding favours and
the line of other equipages coming up, her head whirled.

"That's the Marchioness," a young woman with a bandbox exclaimed,
nudging her companion. "That's 'er! Looks a bit pale, doesn't she?"

"But, oh Gawd! look at them di-monds an' pearls--jess look at 'em!"
cried the other. "Wish it was me."

The breakfast seemed splendid and glittering and long; people seemed
splendid and glittering and far off; and by the time Emily went to
change her bridal magnificence for her travelling costume she had borne
as much strain as she was equal to. She was devoutly grateful for the
relief of finding herself alone in her bedroom with Jane Cupp.

"Jane," she said, "you know exactly how many minutes I can dress in and
just when I must get into the carriage. Can you give me five minutes to
lie down quite flat and dab my forehead with eau de cologne? Five
minutes, Jane. But be quite sure."

"Yes, miss--I do beg pardon--my lady. You can have five--safe."

She took no more,--Jane went into the dressing-room and stood near its
door, holding the watch in her hand,--but even five minutes did her
good.

She felt less delirious when she descended the stairs and passed through
the crowds again on Lord Walderhurst's arm. She seemed to walk through a
garden in resplendent bloom. Then there were the red carpet once more,
and the street people, and the crowd of carriages and liveries, and big,
white favours.

Inside the carriage, and moving away to the echo of the street people's
cheer, she tried to turn and look at Lord Walderhurst with an unalarmed,
if faint, smile.

"Well," he said, with the originality which marked him, "it is really
over!"

"Yes," Emily agreed with him. "And I never can forget Lady Maria's
goodness."

Walderhurst gazed at her with a dawning inquiry in his mind. He himself
did not know what the inquiry was. But it was something a trifle
stimulating. It