Marmaduke, and would rather put an end to it all now, do so, and I will not be angry with you."

"More probably you would be thankful to me," he answered, bitterly.

"I would not. I would far rather trust myself to you than stay at home after what has passed." My voice is trembling, my lips quiver faintly. "But if one of us must be unhappy, let it be me. I release you. I would not---"

"Don't be foolish, child," he makes answer, roughly, "I could not release you, even if I would. You are part of my life and the best part, No; let us keep to our bargain now, whatever comes of it."

His eyes are fixed on mine; gradually a softer light creeps into his face. Putting up his hand, he smoothes back the loose hair from my forehead and kisses me gravely on my lips.

"You are my own little girl," he says, "my most precious possession; I will not have you inconsiderately used. Come, I will speak to your father."

So hand in hand we return to the dragon's den, where, Mr. Carrington having faced the dragon and successfully bullied him, peace is restored, and it is finally arranged that in three weeks we are to be married.

And in three weeks we are married. In three short weeks I glide into a new life, in which Phyllis Carrington holds absolute sway, leaving Phyllis Vernon of the old days--the "general receiver" of the blame of the family--to be buried out of sight forever.

First of all mother takes me up to London, and puts me into the hands of a celebrated _modiste_, a woman of great reputation, with piercing eyes, who scowls at me, prods, taps, and measures me, until I lose sight of my own identity and begin to look upon myself as so many inches and fingers and yards embodied. At length, this terrible person expressing herself satisfied with the examination, we may return home again, whither we are shortly followed by many wicker-framed oil skin-covered trunks, in which lie the results of all the measuring.

Everything is so fresh, so gay, so dainty, that I, who have been kept on such low diet with regard to clothing, am enraptured, and as I dress myself in each new gown and survey myself in mother's long glass, sustain a sensation of pleasurable admiration that must be conceit in an "ugly duckling."

As Madame charmingly and rather shoppily expresses it, my wedding-dress is "a marvel of elegance 

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