drugs were pure and precious, but they were not the
medicine for her complaint. She only felt a sensation of repulsion.

Clarice did not know that the Earl was doing his very best to rescue
her. He insisted on Father Miles going to the Countess about it; nay,
he even ventured an appeal to her himself, though it always cost him
great pain to attempt a conversation with this beloved but irresponsive
woman. But he took nothing by his motion. The Countess was as
obstinate as she was absolute. If anything, the opposition to her will
left her just a shade more determined. In vain her husband pleaded
earnestly with her not to spoil two lives. Hers had been spoiled, she
replied candidly: these ought not to be better off, nor should they be.

"Life has been spoiled for us both," said the Earl, sadly; "but I should
have thought that a reason why we might have been tenderer to others."

"You are a fool!" said the Countess with a flash of angry scorn.

They were the first words she had spoken to him for eighteen years.

"Maybe, my Lady," was the gentle answer. "It would cost me less to be
accounted a fool than it would to break a heart."

And he left her, feeling himself baffled and his endeavours useless, yet
with a glow at his heart notwithstanding. His Margaret had spoken to
him at last. That her words were angry, even abusive, was a
consideration lost in the larger fact. Tears which did not fall welled
up from the soft heart to the dove-like eyes, and he went out to the
terrace to compose himself. "O Margaret, Margaret! if you could have
loved me!" He never thought of blaming her--only of winning her as a
dim hope of some happy future, to be realised when it was God's will.
He had never yet dared to look his cross in the face sufficiently to
add, if it were God's will.

When the Monday came, which was to be the last day of Clarice's maiden
life, it proved a busy, bustling day, with no time for thought until the
evening. Clarice lived through it as best she might. Diana seemed to
have put her disappointment completely behind her, and to be thoroughly
consoled by the bustle and her _trousseau_.

One consideration never occurred to any of the parties concerned, which
would be thought rather desirable in the nineteenth century. This was,
that the respective bridegrooms should have any interview with their
brides elect, or in the slightest degree endeavour to make themselves
agreeable. They met at meals in th