All that was past and gone. The sign which had once so annoyed her was split and burned. It was hers now to _snub_ instead of being snubbed, and so she began by slighting the very ones who had been kind to her, but whom she did not consider worthy of her notice in the days of her prosperity. She should begin her new life as she could hold out, and she would not have Tom, Dick, and Harry hanging to her skirts, she said, and she put aside the friends with whom she had been in the habit of associating intimately, and invited only those with whom it could scarcely be said she had ever been recognized as an equal. Margery was, of course, one of the guests, for she was now Miss Hetherton, of Hetherton Place, and it was an honor to claim her as a relation. Mrs. La Rue was wholly ignored. A woman of her reputation, whose life had been a lie, had no right to expect civilities from the people she had deceived, Anna argued, and Mrs. La Rue’s name was omitted from the list. But the intended slight failed to touch the sad, remorseful woman, who now lived quite alone at the cottage, having resisted all Margery’s entreaties that she should make her home at Hetherton Place. Since her confession, and especially since Queenie’s departure for the South, she had fallen into a sad and silent mood, shrinking from every one, and preferring to live entirely alone, as solitude was best suited to such as she. And so she scarcely gave a thought to the wedding which took place one afternoon in the best room of Tom Ferguson’s house, with only the _elite_ of Merrivale looking on and commenting upon the airs of the bride and the childish delight of the bridegroom, who did not attempt to conceal his joy, but rubbed his hands in the exuberance of delight and kissed the bride many times the moment she was pronounced his wife. There was a short trip to New York, and a long one to Washington, where Anna created a great sensation with her satins, and velvets, and diamonds, which she wore on all occasions. She had sold her youth and beauty for gold, and she meant to reap the full price of her charms. Every day she blossomed out in a new costume, with jewelry to match, and as she was really pretty, and could be very gracious when she tried, Mrs. Lord Seymour Rossiter, became the rage and was flattered, and admired, and complimented to her heart’s content, and mentioned in the papers as the most _distingue_ and lovely woman in Washington—notices which she read with great satisfaction at the breakfast-table every morning, and then passed to her husband, with the remark: “How perfectly absurd! Did you ever read such nonsense?”