Two days after she received a note from the Marquis, saying he would be glad to spend a week with them at Brookfield. She read it quietly, slipped it into the pocket of the black silk that covered the unseen feet, and glided out of the room. Every detail was clear to her. They must leave Dublin to-morrow morning; they need not trouble about calling on a pack of women, but they would have all their men friends to dinner. Mr. Barton, when he was informed of these sudden determinations, was in the act of rehearsing a song he was to sing the following day at a concert. 'But, my dear,' he said, tightening one of the strings; 'the public will be awfully disappointed.' 'Yes, my dear, yes; I am very sorry, but I have my reasons--serious reasons; and in this world we must only do what's right.' 'Then in the next world we shall be able to do everything that's wrong,' said Mr. Barton; and he threw back his blond locks with troubadour-like waves of his lymphatic hand. 'I shall like the next world better than this,' he added, and his wife and daughter laughed; for papa was supposed to be very naughty. 'Olive, dear--' 'Oh, mamma, I wish you wouldn't call me Olive. I shall change my name. Captain Talbot was chaffing me about it yesterday. Everybody chaffs me about it.' 'Never mind, my dear; it makes a subject of conversation. But I was going to tell you that we shall have to start for Brookfield to-morrow.' 'Go to Brookfield! I couldn't possibly leave Dublin yet a while; what would all my young men do--they'd die of broken hearts!' 'It won't matter much if they do; there aren't a dozen worth two thousand a year each.' 'No? You are joking, mamma. And the Marquis?' 'That's a secret, dear.' 'Then you don't think he'll propose to me after all; and I gave up Edward--Captain Hibbert.' 'I thought you had forgotten that horrid man's name. I didn't say, dear, that the Marquis wouldn't propose to you--of course he will. But we must leave Dublin to-morrow--I have serious reasons.' 'Oh, mamma, I didn't think you were so cruel, to go back to that hateful place, where everybody talks of rents, and that odious Land League.' 'Now, I will not allow my darling to cry like that,' exclaimed Mrs. Barton, and she threw her arms round the girl's shoulders. 'I didn't say that there wouldn't be a man within seven miles. On the contrary, there will be one very charming man indeed.' 'What do you mean, mamma?' 'That's a secret--that's a secret.' Alice was told that she had better come home early that afternoon, so that she might have plenty of time to pack her own things and help her sister with hers; and it seemed to her unbelievable that she was at last leaving that hateful little varnished floor, complimenting old beaux and young A.D.C.'s. But if to nobody else, she must say good-bye to May. She had hardly seen her since the night of the State ball--the night she had given Fred Scully permission to see her in her room. She found her in the ladies' drawing-room.