ing upon it from behind. In front, above
the lunar forehead, among the coronal masses, darkly fair, she fixed a
diamond star, and over it wound the smoky green like a turbaned vapor,
wind-ruffled, through which the diamonds gleamed faintly by fits. Not
once would she, while at her work, allow Hesper to look, and the
self-willed lady had been submissive in her hands as a child of the
chosen; but the moment she had succeeded--for her expectations were
more than realized--she led her to the cheval-glass. Hesper gazed for
an instant, then, turning, threw her arms about Mary, and kissed her.

"I don't believe you're a human creature at all!" she cried. "You are a
fairy godmother, come to look after your poor Cinderella, the sport of
stupid lady's-maids and dressmakers!"

The door opened, and Folter entered.

"If you please, ma'am, I wish to leave this day month," she said,
quietly.

"Then," answered her mistress, with equal calmness, "oblige me by going
at once to Mrs. Perkin, and telling her that I desire her to pay you a
month's wages, and let you leave the house to-morrow morning.--You
won't mind helping me to dress till I get another maid--will you,
Mary?" she added; and Folter left the room, chagrined at her inability
to cause annoyance.

"I do not see why you should have another maid so long as I am with
you, ma'am," said Mary. "It should not need many days' apprenticeship
to make one woman able to dress another."

"Not when she is like you, Mary," said Hesper. "It is well the wretch
has done my hair for to-night, though! That will be the main
difficulty."

"It will not be a great one," said Mary, "if you will allow me to undo
it when you come home."

"I begin almost to believe in a special providence," said Hesper. "What
a blessed thing for me that you came to drive away that woman! She has
been getting worse and worse."

"If I have driven her away," answered Mary, "I am bound to supply her
place."

As they talked, she was giving her final touches of arrangement to the
head-dress--with which she found it least easy to satisfy herself. It
swept round from behind in a misty cloak, the two colors mingling with
and gently obscuring each other; while, between them, the palest memory
of light, in the golden cincture, helped to bring out the somber
richness, the delicate darkness of the whole.

Searching now again Hesper's jewel-case, Mary found a fine bracelet of
the true, the Oriental topaz, the old chrysoli