verybody; she was half-mad with fatigue
and despondency.

Oh, what was the use of living--what was the use of living! Chris
despised her; that was quite plain. He had advised her to-night as he
would have advised an ignorant servant--an inexperienced commoner who
might make the family ridiculous--who might lose her head, and descend
to "unnecessary pieces of vulgarity!" Leslie had always "made allowances
for Norma"; Annie considered her an "outsider." Wolf was going to
California without her, and even Aunt Kate--even Aunt Kate had scolded
her, reminded her that the Melroses had always been kind to her!

Norma's tears flowed fast, there seemed to be no end to the flood. She
sopped them away with the black-bordered handkerchief, and tried walking
about, and drinking cold water, but it was of no use. Her heart seemed
broken, there was no avenue for her thoughts that did not lead to
loneliness and grief. They had all pretended to love her--but not one of
them did--not one of them did! She had never had a father, and never had
a mother, she had never had a fair chance!

Money--she thought darkly. But what was the use of money if everyone
hated her, if everyone thought she was selfish and stupid and ignorant
and superfluous! Why find a beautiful apartment, and buy beautiful
clothes, if she must flatter and cajole her way into Annie's favour to
enjoy them, and bear Chris's superior disdain for her stumbling literary
criticisms and her amateurish Italian?

And she was furious at Chris. How dared he--how dared he insult her by
coupling her name with that of Roy Gillespie, to quiet Annie and to
protect himself! She was a married woman; she had never given him any
reason to take such liberties with her dignity! Roy Gillespie, indeed!
Annie was to amuse herself by fancying Norma secretly enamoured of that
big, stupid, simple Gillespie boy, who was twenty-two years old, and
hardly out of college! And it was for him that Norma was presumably
leaving her husband!

It was insufferable. It was insufferable. She would go straight to
Annie--but no, she couldn't do that. She couldn't tell Annie, on the
night before Annie's sister was buried, that that same sister's husband
loved and was beloved by another woman.

"Still, it's true," Norma mused, darkly. "Only we seem unable to speak
the truth in this house! Well, I'm stifling here----"

She had been leaning out of the open window, the night was soft and
warm. Norma looked at her wr