"It is a brave man that tries to blacken a woman's name," she answered; and went on her way. In the dressing-room was Alice, who had gone a moment before. Mrs. Neligage went up to her and took her by the arms. "How did you know that I needed to have a plank thrown to me?" she demanded. "Did I show it so much?" Alice flushed and smiled. "If I must tell the truth," she answered, "you looked just as I saw Jack look once in a hard place." Mrs. Neligage laughed, and kissed her. "Then it was Jack's mother you wanted to help. You are an angel anyhow. I had really lost my head. The story was horrid, and I knew he'd tell it or hint it. It wasn't so bad," she added, as Alice half shrank back, "but that I'll tell it to you some time. Jack knows it." XXV THE WAKING OF A SPINSTER Miss Wentstile was as accustomed to having her way as the sun is to rising. She had made up her mind that Alice was to marry Count Shimbowski, and what was more, she had made her intention perfectly plain to her friends. It is easily to be understood that her temper was a good deal tried when it became evident that she could not force her niece to yield. Miss Wentstile commanded, she remonstrated, she tried to carry her will with a high hand by assuming that Alice was betrothed, and she found herself in the end utterly foiled. "Then you mean to disobey me entirely," she said to Alice one day. "I have tried all my life to do what you wanted, Aunt Sarah," was the answer, "but this I can't do." "You could do it if you chose." Alice was silent; and to remain silent when one should offer some sort of a remark that may be disputed or found fault with or turned into ridicule is one of the most odious forms of insubordination. "Why don't you speak?" demanded Miss Wentstile sharply. "Haven't I done enough for you to be able to get a civil answer out of you?" "What is there for me to say more, Aunt Sarah?" "You ought to say that you would not vex and disobey me any more," declared her Aunt. "Here I have told everybody that I should pass next summer at the Count's ancestral castle in Hungary, and how can I if you won't marry him?" "You might marry him yourself." Her aunt glared at her angrily, and emitted a most unladylike snort of contempt. "You say that to be nasty," she retorted; "but I tell you, miss, that I've thought of that myself. I'm not sure I shan't marry him." Alice regarded her in a silence which drew forth a fresh volley. "I suppose you think that's absurd, do you? Why don't you say that I'm too old, and too ugly, and too ridiculous? Why don't you say it? I can see that you think it; and a nice thing it is to think, too." "If you think it, Aunt Sarah," was the demure reply, "there's no need of my saying it." "I think it? I don't think it! I'm pleased to know at last what you think of me, with your meek ways."