"She might have had the goodness to remember there were more in the family. Mrs. Grandon and myself," declares Eugene, almost in a tone of vexation. "What was the opera? I think you _are_ getting very----" "'Martha,'" he interrupts, quickly. "An acquaintance of madame's sang as _Plunkett_, and did extremely well; a young Italian who only a year or two ago lost his fortune." "Brignoli used to be divine as _Lionel_," says Marcia. "I don't believe I should like another person in that _role_. Of course madame is making a great sensation in New York. What a wonderfully handsome woman she is, and--do you remember, Gertrude, whether any one ever made any great fuss about her in her youth?" Gertrude colors at this thrust of ancient memory. "She is the handsomest woman I ever saw," begins Eugene, and his glance falls upon Violet. "Of course she was handsome always, and you need not hint enviously of a lost youth, Marcia. She looks younger than any of you girls to-day. There wasn't one at Newport who could hold a candle to her. The men were mowed down 'n swaths. Not one could stand before her." "Then _I_ say she is a coquette," is Marcia's decisive reply. "I dare say there will be no end of dinners and Germans and lovers. It's fearfully mean in Laura not to take a house for the winter and invite a body down. It is horrid dull here! Floyd, do _you_ mean to stay up all winter?" "Why not? I have not spent a winter here since I was a boy, in the old farm-house with Aunt Marcia." "What an awful place it was!" Marcia is quite forgetting her _role_ of severe high art. "I believe she always chose the coldest days in winter and the warmest days in summer to invite us. I don't see how you endured it!" "I not only endured it," says Floyd, meditatively, "but I liked it." "Well, one _might_ like it with a fortune in the background," Eugene rejoins, with covert insolence. The dessert is being brought in, which causes a lull in the family strictures. Floyd frowns and is silent. When they rise, Cecil runs to the drawing-room, and the two follow her. "Play a little," says her husband; and Violet sits down, thinking of the handsome woman she has never yet seen, but who seems to have bewitched all the family. Floyd is down twice again before the day on which he escorts his mother home. On one of these occasions he buys the pony. Violet and Cecil are both filled with delight, and Floyd gives his wife a little driving practice. He is so good to her, she thinks, but she sometimes wishes he would talk to her about madame. They are quite enthusiastic at Mrs. Grandon's return, but her distance and elegance chill Violet to the very soul. She has no part in the general cordiality, and Floyd finds himself helpless to mend matters. For the first time since he has come home he regrets that this great house is his portion, and that half, at least, had not gone to the rest. He has a desperate desire to take Violet and live in the cottage, as Cecil has proposed.