CHAPTER XV. "The branches cross above our eyes, The skies are in a net." The plans have been made without taking Violet into the slightest account, or Floyd, as master of the house. Laura and madame are to come up for a week, and there must be a dinner and an evening party. Laura was compelled to have such a quiet wedding, and it was really shameful to make so much use of madame and offer her so little in return. "I really don't know what to do about the rooms," says Mrs. Grandon. "It was absurd in Floyd to take that elegant spare chamber when he had two rooms of his own and all the tower; and if one should say a word, my lady would be in high dudgeon, no doubt." "Mother," begins Gertrude in a calm tone,--and it seems as if Gertrude had lost her sickly whine in this bracing autumn weather,--"you do Violet great injustice. She will give up the room with pleasure the moment she is asked." "Oh, I dare say!" with a touch of scorn, meant to wither both speaker and person spoken of, "if I were to go down on my knees, which I never have done yet." "You forget the house is Floyd's." "No, I do _not_; I am not allowed to," with stately emphasis. "When Floyd was down to the city he was the tenderest of sons to me. She is a sly, treacherous little thing; you can see it in her face. I never would trust a person with red hair, and she sets him up continually. He is so different when he is away from her; Laura remarked it. How he ever could have married her!" "It would be the simplest act of courtesy to speak about the room; just mention it to Floyd." Mrs. Grandon draws a long, despairing sigh, as if she had been put upon to the uttermost. "We must invite the Brades and the Van Bergens to the dinner, though I suppose Laura will choose the guests and divide them to her liking; only at the dinner we shall have no dancing. Laura is to come up to-morrow." "If you would like me to speak about the room----" says Gertrude. "I believe I am still capable of attending to my own affairs," is the lofty rejoinder. Marcia, with her head full of coming events, waylays Floyd on his return that morning. "I want some money," she says, with a kind of infantile gayety. "I have bills and bills; their name is legion." "How much?" he asks, briefly. "I think--you may as well give me a thousand dollars," in a rather slow, considering tone. He looks at her in surprise. "Well," and she tosses her head, setting the short curls in a flutter, "is a thousand dollars so large a sum?" "You had better think before spending it," he answers, gravely. "You will then have four thousand left." "It is my own money." "I know it is. But, Marcia, you all act as if there was to be no end to it. If you should get all your part, the ten thousand, it would be only a small sum and easily spent. What do you want to do with so much just now?"