ns--lay on the centre table;
Martie pushed them back for her game.

She looked a mere overgrown, untidy girl, to whose hair, belt,
finger-nails, and shoes she might have attended with advantage. But
Martie was a bride to-night, walking the realm of Romance.

She had never had an admirer, nor had Sally. Neither girl admitted it,
but it was true. Poor Lydia had had a taste of the joy of life, and a
full measure of the sorrow, seven years ago, when Clifford Frost,
twelve years her senior, at thirty-one the perfect match, had singled
her out for his favour. Martie and Sally could remember how pleasantly
exciting it was to have Cliff Frost so much at the house, how Lydia
laughed and bloomed! Lydia had been just Sally then: her age, and her
double.

What had gone wrong, the younger girls sometimes wondered. Pa had been
pompous, of course; Cliff had not been made exactly comfortable, here
by this marble mantel. Lydia had quavered out her happy welcome, her
mother had fluttered and smiled. And Cliff had given her candy, and
taken her to the Methodist Bazaar and the Elks' Minstrels, and had
given her a fan. The candy was eaten long ago, and the dance music and
the concerts long forgotten in the village, but Lydia still had the fan.

For a year, for two, for three, the affair went on. There was a cloud
in the sky before Mary Canfield came to visit Mrs. Frost, but with her
coming, joy died in Lydia's heart. Mary was made for loving; Mary's
mother and father and aunts and cousins all made it easy for any man to
fall in love with her. Mary danced, played the piano, chattered French,
changed from one pretty frock to another, tirelessly. In short, Mary
was a marketable product, and Lydia was not.

Cliff came to tell Lydia that he and Mary were to be married, and that
she had always been his best pal, and that their friendship had been
one of the sweetest things in his life. He kissed her in brotherly
fashion when he went away. Mary, lovely in bridal silks, came to call
on Lydia a few months later, and to this day when she met faded, sweet
Miss Monroe, the happy little wife and mother would stop in street or
shop and display little Ruth's charms, and chat graciously for a few
minutes. She always defended Lydia when the Frost and Parker factions
lamented that the Monroe girls were inclined to be "common."

Martie thought of none of these things to-night. She thought of Rodney
Parker, and her heart floated upon clouds of rose-colou