there could be no doubt as to the prettiness,
and the airy, youthful aspect--younger, perhaps, than her years. Agatha
was perfectly astounded to find in this gay "Harrie" the wife of the
grave and middle-aged Duke Dugdale!

"You see, my dear--ahem! what shall I call you?--that I can't be formal
and polite, and it's no use trying. So I just left my father sitting
stately in the drawing-room with Mary on one side, as mistress of the
household; Eulalie on the other, looking as bewitching and effective as
she can, and both dying with curiosity to run out and see you. But I'm
not a Miss Harper now; so, while they longed to do it, I--did it. Here I
am! Welcome home, Mrs. Locke Harper!"

"Thank you," stammered the young bride, hardly knowing whether to laugh
or to cry. Her husband was scarcely less agitated than herself, but
showed it only in the nervous trembling of his upper lip, and in the
extreme brevity of his words. He lifted his wife down from the carriage,
and Mrs. Dugdale, throwing back the blue veil, peered curiously into the
face of her new sister.

"E--h!" she said, in that long musical ejaculation just like her
husband--the only thing in which she was like him. Never was a pair
who so fully exemplified the theory of matrimonial opposites. "E--h,
Nathanael!" And her quick glance at her brother indicated undisguised
admiration of "the Pawnee-face."

He himself looked restless, uncomfortable, as if his sister slightly
fidgeted him; she had indeed, with all her heartiness, a certain
quicksilverishness of manner, jumping here, there, and everywhere like
mercury on a plate, in a fashion that was very perplexing at first to
quiet people.

"Come along, my dear," continued Harrie, tucking the young wife under
her arm--"come and beautify a little--the Squire likes it. And run
away to your father, N. L., my boy!" added she to her younger
brother--younger--as a closer inspection of her fresh country face
showed--possibly by some five or six years.

Mr. Harper assented with as good a grace as he could, and resigned his
wife to his sister.

For the next ten minutes Agatha had a confused notion of being taken
through many rooms and passages, hovered about by Mrs. Dugdale, her
flounces, and her lively talk--of trying to answer a dozen questions per
minute, and being so bewildered, that she succeeded in answering none,
save that she had met Mr. Dugdale--that she did _not_ think him "a
beauty," and (she hastily and in terr