It did not disturb her when the steamer was overdue one whole day, and then two. Starr, even amid the round of gaieties in her young set, all given in her honor, found time to worry about her father; but the wife only found in this fact a cause for congratulation. She felt instinctively that her crucial time was coming when her husband reached home. If Michael had dared to carry out his threats, or if a breath of the stories concerning young Carter’s life should reach him there would be trouble against which she had no power. It was not until the third morning with still no news of the vessel that Mrs. Endicott began to feel uneasy. It would be most awkward to have to put off the ceremony, and of course it would not do to have it without the bride’s father when he was hurrying to be present. If he would arrive just in time so much the better; but late—ah—that would be dreadful! She tightened her determined lips, and looked like a Napoleon saying to herself, “There shall be no Alps!” In like manner she would have said if she could: “There shall be no sea if I wish it.” But the anxiety she felt was only manifested by her closer vigilance over her helpers as swiftly and hourly the perfected preparations glided to their finish. Starr grew nervous and restless and could not sleep, but hovered from room to room in the daytime looking out of the windows, or fitfully telephoning the steamship company for news. Her fiancé found her most unsatisfactory and none of the plans he proposed for her diversion pleased her. Dark rings appeared under her eyes, and she looked at him with a troubled expression sometimes when she should have been laughing in the midst of a round of pleasures. Starr deeply loved her father, and some vague presentiment of coming trouble seemed to shadow all the brightness of life. Now and then Michael’s face with its great, true eyes, and pleading expression came between her and Carter’s face, and seemed to blur its handsome lines; and then indefinite questions haunted her. What if those terrible things Michael had said were true? Was she sure, _sure_? And at times like that she fancied she saw a weakness in the lines about Carter’s eyes and mouth. But she was most unused to studying character, poor child, and had no guide to help her in her lonely problem of choosing; for already she had learned that her mother’s ways and hers were not the same; and—her father—did not come. When he came it would be all right. It had to be, for there was no turning back, of course, now. The wedding was but two days off.