Her patient hands were folded in her silken lap; she had nothing to do, and very little to think about. The blasphemous triumph was accomplished; she was about to see Sin crowned and rewarded, Innocence betrayed and abandoned--in other words, Angelica married to Eddie. She was disgusted with life, thoroughly disappointed with her God. She took no pleasure in these preparations, or in any of the comforts and enjoyments before her. Nothing sustained her but a vague sort of hope that her just God would retrieve Himself by stopping this wedding in some way--with thunderbolts, or the flaming swords of archangels. And she was well aware that one couldn’t really count upon anything of that sort. Out in the kitchen she could hear the servant--she, the charwoman, servant of servants, sitting in the parlour while another woman drudged for her! In half an hour an automobile was coming to take them to the church, and then they were going off to Buena Vista, going to leave all this poverty and humiliation behind forever. She had been given to understand that she wasn’t to _live_ with her child, only to visit until a suitable home could be found for her. She was to have an apartment and a servant all of her own; she was to furnish the place as she wished, and she was to be provided with a new wardrobe. "And start a new life," Angelica told her. "I’ll need to!" said Mrs. Kennedy. "This one is about done." And although a great deal of this was paid for by Angie herself, out of the money she had saved, her mother had never expressed gratitude. She didn’t feel any. She had never at any moment of her life been so utterly dissatisfied. She glanced at the new clock. "Angie!" she called. "What are you doing?" "Dressing!" called back a gay, a too gay voice. "He’ll be here in half an hour." "I’ll be ready!" II She was standing before the mirror in the bedroom, adjusting her hat, very delicately touching her hair under its net, tilting her head from side to side, frowning thoughtfully, trying to foresee the effect she would produce upon Sillon and Devery, Mrs. Russell and Polly, who would be in the church. She pictured herself and Eddie walking up the aisle--Eddie still in uniform, tall, severe, impressive, and beside him his beautiful young bride. She was wearing a plain dark brown broadcloth suit, a big black hat, and a magnificent set of silver fox furs Eddie had given her. She looked like a princess. They couldn’t, any of them, find a flaw in her--in her appearance or in her bearing. None of those born ladies could approach her. She looked what she was determined actually to be, the equal of any one of them. There was a position ready for her, and she was competent to fill it.