"I _like_ him, and that is better. _You_ were blind to papa's faults because you loved him; that was a mistake. Now, I shall _not_ be blind to Marmaduke's; and if he does anything very horrid, or develops unpleasant symptoms, I shall be able to give him up before it is too late. If you had been fully alive to papa's little tempers, mother, I don't suppose you would _ever_ have married him; would you?" "Phyllis, I cannot allow you to discuss your father in this manner. It is neither dutiful nor proper; and it vexes me very much." "Then I won't vex you. But I read in a book the other day. 'It is better to respect your husband than to love him.'" "One should do both, of course; but, oh, Phyllis, try to _love_ him; that is the great softener in the married life. It is so easy to forgive when love urges. You are wrong, my pet, but you have a tender heart, and so I pray all may be well with you. Yet when I think of your leaving me to face the wide world I feel lonely. I fancy I could have better spared Dora than my own wild Phyllis." She whispers this soothingly into my ear, kisses me as only a mother _can_ kiss, and leaves me presently wholly comforted. If mother indeed loves me, the scapegrace, better than her model Dora, I have reason to feel glad and grateful. Meanwhile the household is divided. "The boy Billee," as Roland calls him, has been sent for two hours into solitary confinement, because, on hearing the great news, he exclaimed, "Didn't I tell you all along how it would be?" in a heartless and triumphant manner, thus adding insult to Dora's injury. Roly also is on my side, and comes upstairs to tell me so. "You have twice the spirit, you know," he says, in a tone meant to compliment. "Dora is too dead-and-alive; no man born would be tormented with her. I am awfully glad, Phyllis." And then he speaks of poor "Dora," and a moment later goes into convulsions of laughter over "poor Dora's" discomfiture. "She made so sure, don't you know, and that; had upset and re-arranged Strangemore and Carrington and everything to her own entire satisfaction. Oh, by Jove, it is the best joke I ever heard in my life!" And so on. When by chance during the evening papa and I meet, though his manner is frozen, he makes no offensive remarks; and, strange as it appears to me, I seem to have gained some dignity in his eyes. So the long hours of that day drag by, and night falls at last. After dinner Dora comes creeping in, her eyelids red and swollen, her dainty cheeks bereft of their usual soft pink. Misery and despair are depicted in every line of her face and figure. Papa rises ostentatiously and pushes an easy chair towards the fire for her (already the touch of winter is upon us.) Mamma pours out a glass of papa's own port. Even Billy proclaims a truce for the time being, and places a soft stool beneath my injured sister's feet, while I sit apart and feel myself a murderess.