“And so you will, no doubt, in five minutes,” assented his partner briskly, “and as soon as you have left, Fairy will reason her back again. Surely, my dear, you know Mrs. Gordon? The whole matter rests in Fairy’s hands, and our only hope is that she may change her mind, or get the influenza, and there is but little chance of either.” It was now the turn of the Rev. James to expostulate angrily with his companion. * * * * * The next three days were a period of unexampled misery to most of the inmates at Merry Meetings. Fairy was feverishly gay and feverishly busy. Though a severe cold kept her at home, she was never separated from her beloved patterns, no, not even when in bed. Most of her time was spent in writing to shops, making calculations in pencil, trimming hats, and searching through fashion-plates. She now had but two topics of conversation, India and dress. Meanwhile her mother and sisters looked on, powerless, and in a manner paralyzed by the sturdy will of this small autocrat. In these days there was considerable traffic to and fro from Merry Meetings, and an unusual amount of knocks and rings at Mrs. Gordon’s modest little green hall door. The postman, instead of bringing one paper and a meagre envelope as of yore, now staggered under a load of large brown-paper parcels, and an immense variety of card-board boxes. Telegrams were an every-day arrival, and letters poured in by the dozen. Fairy’s preparations were advancing steadily, though her sisters whispered gravely to one another, that “she must not be allowed to go.” Who was to prevent her? Not her mother, who sat in her usual armchair, looking harassed and woe-begone, and now and then heaved heartrending sighs and applied a damp pocket-handkerchief to her eyes. Not the rector. He had reasoned with Fairy long and, as he believed, eloquently; but in vain. He pointed out her mother’s grief, her great reluctance to part with her favourite child, her own uncertain health, but he spoke to deaf ears; and Dr. Banks, despite his wife’s proud boast, fared but little better. He solemnly assured Fairy that she was not fit to go to India, to undertake the long journey alone; and, whatever her aunt might say, the climate was only suited to people with robust constitutions. “Was she robust?” he demanded with asperity. “He knew best,” she retorted in her pertest manner. “One thing she did know, she was _going_. Her aunt had especially invited her, and why should she not have some amusement and see something of the world? instead of being buried alive at Hoyle. It was not living, it was mouldering.” “At any rate she would live longer at Hoyle than in India,” the doctor angrily assured her. He was furious with this selfish, egotistical scrap of humanity, who had always secured the best of everything that fell to the lot of her impoverished family.