de him, socially at any rate, a
fairly good wife. Her one idea was social aggrandizement at any cost, and
I unhappily was to fall a victim to it.

"I suppose we ought not to blame her for determining that I ought to
marry well; she wanted to do the best for the family and was
constitutionally incapable of making allowance for or considering any
one's private feelings. To make a long story short, my stepmother, in
pursuance of her policy, determined that I should marry a certain peer
whose name I need not mention. He was altogether a bad lot, and I soon
came to know it. I received certain warnings, but without them I could
see that the man was all wrong, and I told my stepmother what I
thought of him.

"She scoffed at the idea that he was any worse than the average man. All
I had to concern myself with was the fact that he was a peer of ancient
lineage, of large property, and there wasn't another girl in the kingdom
who wouldn't jump at him. I might well chance his making me unhappy since
he could make me a countess, and to refuse him would be absolute madness;
Mrs. Morriston's face grew black at the very thought of it. She soon got
my father on to her side, and between them I had a hateful time of it.
It's the old story, which will be told as long as there are worldly,
selfish women on the earth, but it was none the less fresh and poignant
to me who had to live through the experience.

"Things got so bad through my continued refusal to fall in with my
stepmother's wishes that I was reduced to a state bordering on despair.
My father, whom I loved, was turned against me; his mind was so
prejudiced in favour of the man whom I was being gradually forced to take
as a husband that he could see no good reason, only sheer obstinacy, in
my refusal. Altogether my life was becoming a perfect hell. Dick, who
might have stood by me, and made things less unbearable, was away on a
two years' tour for big game shooting; I had no one to confide in, no one
to help me.

"Just as things were at their worst and I was getting quite desperate, I
met at a dance a man named Archie Jolliffe. He had been a sailor, but
having come into money had given up the Service and settled down to enjoy
himself. He and I got on very well together from the first; he was a
breezy, genial, young fellow, fond of fun and adventure and a pleasant
contrast in every way to the man who was threatening to ruin my life. I
don't know that in happier circumstances I s