d doll; but a tyrant and
oppressor, crueller and more menacing because infinitely weak and
unstable.

Marcia did not reply at all to her mother's question, but with her lashes
still downcast, continued to button her gloves; and Hayden stood,
miserably uncomfortable for a moment, and then was forced to doubt the
correctness of his swift, unpleasant impression; for Mrs. Oldham observed
in her usual petulant, inconsequent tones:

"I don't know that I like that necklace with that frock, Marcia. Your
turquoises would look better. I do get so tired of always seeing you with
some kind of a butterfly ornament. You never showed the slightest
interest in butterflies before your father died, and you don't, in the
least, suggest a butterfly. I can not understand it."

"Don't try, mother dear," said Marcia. "Good-by." She kissed the orchid
and gray lady lightly on the top of the head. "Have a good time with your
Hamburg grapes and your last new novel."

She slipped her arms through the long white coat Hayden held for her and,
followed by him, left the room.

"Marcia, dear, sweet Marcia," he coaxed, as they whirled through the
streets in her electric brougham. "I'm sure, almost dead sure, it's going
to be a nice, well-baked, plum-y cake. If it is won't you promise to eat
it with me? You know you didn't definitely promise this afternoon, and I
never could stand uncertainty."

"No," she said positively, drawing her hand away from his, "I will not. I
will never give you a definite answer until you offer me a share in the
cake, no matter how it turns out in the baking."

"How can I?" he groaned. "You do not know what sort of a life it would
be, the hardships, the deprivations, the necessarily long separations
when I would have to be in some place utterly impossible for you, for
months at a time. It's the very abomination of desolation. And fancy your
trying to adapt yourself to it! You, used to this!" rapping the electric.
"And this, and this!" touching lightly the ermine on her cloak and the
jewels at her throat. "No." He shook his head doggedly. "I won't. I know
what it means and you do not. Lovely butterfly"--the tenderness of his
voice stirred her heart-strings--"do you think that I could bear to see
you beaten to earth, your bright wings torn and faded by the cruel
storms? Never. But," with one of his quick, mercurial changes of mood,
"it's an alternative that we do not have to face. For it's coming out all
right in the baki