"Well, Lucy, I wish you happy," Mrs. St. John said; "but it is not the marriage you should have made." "Perhaps not. I suppose not. For Mr. Arkell's family is of course inferior to mine----" "Inferior! Mr. Arkell's family!" interrupted Mrs. St. John, all her aristocratic prejudices offended at the words. "What do you mean, Lucy? Mr. Arkell is of _no_ family! They are tradespeople--manufacturers. We don't speak of that class as 'a family.' _You_ are of our order; and I can tell you, the Cheveleys have had the best blood in their veins. It is a very sad descent for you; little less--my dear, I cannot help speaking--than degradation for life." "If I had good family," spoke Lucy, "what else had I?" "_Beauty!_" was Mrs. St. John's involuntary answer, as she gazed at the wondrously lustrous brown eyes, the bright exquisite features. "Beauty!" echoed Lucy, in surprise. "Oh, Mrs. St. John! you forget." "Forget what, Lucy." "That I am deformed." The word was spoken in a painful whisper, and the sensitive complexion grew carmine with the sense of shame. It is ever so. Where any defect of person exists, none can feel it as does its possessor; it is to the mind one ever-present agony of humiliation. Lucy Cheveley's spine was not straight; of fragile make and constitution, she had "grown aside," as the familiar saying runs; but at this early period of her life it was not so apparent to a beholder (unless the defect was known and searched for) as it afterwards became. "You are not very much so, Lucy," was Mrs. St. John's answer. "And your face compensates for it." Lucy shook her head. "You say so from kindness, I am sure. Do you know," she resumed, her voice again becoming almost inaudible, "I once heard Mrs. Dewsbury joking with Sir Edward about me. He was down for a week about a year ago, and she was telling him he ought to get married and settle down to a steady life. He answered that he could get nobody to have him, and Mrs. Dewsbury--of course you know it was only a jesting conversation on both sides--said, 'There's Lucy Cheveley, would she do for you?' '_She_,' he exclaimed; 'she's deformed!' Mrs. St. John, will you believe that for a long while after I felt sick at having to go out, or to cross a room?" "Yes, I can believe it," said Mrs. St. John, sadly, for she was not unacquainted with this sensitive phase in human misfortune. "Well, Lucy, you cannot be convinced, I dare say, that your figure is _not_ unsightly, so we will let that pass. But I do not understand yet, how you came to marry Peter Arkell." Lucy laughed and blushed. "Ah! I see; you loved him. And yet, few, save you, would find Peter Arkell so lovable a man." "If you only knew his worth, Mrs. St. John!" "I dare say. But as a knight-errant he is not attractive. Of course, the chief consideration now, is--the thing being irrevocably done, and you here--what sort of a home will he be able to keep for you."