dread
asters, I do; not but what golden-rods is almost worse."

"Anne," said a voice in the hall.

Anne opened the door; it was Helen, with her roses.

"These are the Grand Llama's apartments, I suppose," she said, peeping
in. "I will not enter; merely gaze over the sacred threshold. Come to my
room, Crystal, for half an hour; I am going to drive at eleven."

"I must finish arranging these plants."

"Then come when you have finished. Do not fail; I shall wait for you."
And the white robe floated off down the dark sidling hall, as Miss
Vanhorn's heavy foot made itself heard ascending the stairs. When
Bessmer had gone to her breakfast, to collect what strength she could
for another aster-day, Anne summoned her courage.

"Grandaunt, I would like to speak to you," she said.

"And I do not want to be spoken to; I have neuralgia in my cheek-bones."

"But I would like to tell you--"

"And I do not want to be told. You are always getting up sensations of
one kind or another, which amount to nothing in the end. Be ready to
drive to Updegraff's glen at eleven; that is all I have to say to you
now." She went into the inner room, and closed the door.

"It does not make any difference," thought Anne, drearily; "I shall tell
her at eleven."

Then, nerving herself for another kind of ordeal, she went slowly toward
Helen's apartments.

But conventionality is a strong power: she passed the first fifteen
minutes of conversation without faltering.

Then Helen said: "You look pale, Crystal. What is the matter?"

"I did not sleep well."

"And there is some trouble besides! I see by the note-book that you have
been with the Bishop almost constantly; confess that you like him!"

"Yes, I like him."

"Very much?"

"Yes."

"_Very_ much?"

"You know, Helen, that I am engaged."

"That! for your engagement," said Mrs. Lorrington, taking a rose and
tossing it toward her. "I know you are engaged. But I thought that if
the Bishop would only get into one of his dead-earnest moods--he is
capable of it--you would have to yield. For you are capable of it too."

"Capable of what? Breaking a promise?"

"Do not be disagreeable; I am complimenting you. No; I mean capable of
loving--really loving."

"All women can love, can they not?"

"Themselves! Yes. But rarely any one else. And now let me tell you
something delightful--one of those irrelevant little inconsistencies
which make society amusing: _I_ am going to drive with the