all, to be worn by the little girls in the ornamental fashion I have described. He smiled impartially from their various tuckers; and, indeed, many of the youthful possessors of those little gilt lockets are true to this day to their early impressions. [Footnote 1: Written before recent events in France.] So both Dolly and Rhoda came to tell Lady Sarah that they had made up their minds, what they most admired. The widow had been sitting upon one of the benches in the garden, feeling not unlike the skeleton at a feast--a scanty figure in the sunshine, with a heart scarcely attuned to the bustle and chatter around her, but she began to tell herself that there must be some use even in the pomps and vanities of life, when she saw how happy the little girls looked, how the light had come into Dolly's eyes, and then she gave them each a solid silver piece out of a purse, which, contrary to the custom of skeletons, she held ready in her hand. 'Oh, thank you,' says Dolly; 'now I can get no end of things. There's George and Robert and----' 'It is much better to buy _one_ nice thing to take care of than a great many little ones,' said Rhoda, philosophically. 'Dolly, you don't manage well. I don't want to get everything I see. I shall buy that pretty locket. None of the girls in my class have got one as pretty.' 'Come along quick then,' said Dolly, 'for fear they should have sold it.' They left the Palais Royal at last and drove homewards with their treasures. Dolly never forgot that evening; the carriage drove along through the May-lit city, by teeming streets, by shady avenues, to the sounds of life and pleasure-making. Carriages were rolling along with them; long lines of trees, of people, of pavements led to a great triumphal archway, over which the little pink clouds were floating, while an intense sweet thrill of spring rung in the air and in the spirits of the people. Henriette opened the door to them when they got home. 'The poor gentleman from below,' she said, 'is waiting for you in the drawing-room. I told him you would not be long.' * * * * * The gentleman was waiting in the drawing-room as Lady Sarah came in with the two little girls shyly following. She would have sent them away, but a sort of shyness habitual to her made her shrink from a scene or an explanation. It may have been some feeling of the same sort which had induced the widower to go away to the farthest window of the room, where he stood leaning out with his back turned for an instant after they had come in.