The parting was easier than might have been expected, for we all rose to the occasion. Uncle had been drilled over night, and his perplexity and Aunt's preparations for leaving home amused me. The trip to Bermuda had been proposed for my sake, Aunt had only half desired it; but now she forgot her fears of winter storms, seasickness and shipwreck, and clutched at the excuse to whisk Milly out of reach of Ned Hynes and out of sight of me. Her tone was dulcet sweet. "We can't blame you for preferring New York, when the Van Dams are so lovely to you," she said complacently. "But Ethel is delicate. Bermuda'll do her a world of good; though of course it's not fashionable.'" "I'm sure you'll have a lovely trip," I said. "You must let me help you pack." She was turning the house topsy-turvy in her zeal to sail by the next boat, the very next day. She succeeded; and when she left the house I left it, too; to come here; to the General; to a house that would two months ago have seemed a palace such as I could never dream of living in. It would suit me better to be independent, to be sometimes alone, to feel that I shouldn't have a shrewd woman's eyes so much upon me. But for the present--it is my refuge! At Christmas I should have broken down and sobbed when I saw the last of the Bakers, instead of dropping honeyed sentences and undulating out of the room--like--like--. He called me once the Goddess glowing in her walk. I have changed this winter, mentally as well as physically. CHAPTER II. THE IRONY OF LIFE. I've been feverishly gay since I came to Meg. I have walked between stormwinds--grief behind and grief that I must enter. I've dined and danced, and I've clenched my hands lest I might shriek, and I've longed to hide away and die. But I won't die. I'm not like other women--a silly, whining pack, their hearts the same fluttering page blotted with the same tears wept in Hell or Heaven. Love is a draught for two--or one; wretched one!--to drink. My life is for the world. Oh, I've been a child, caring only for the lights and the pretty things and the music; but I'm not blind now. I understand many things that were hidden from the plain girl from the West. I have lived a year in every day. I see as they are these people I have thought so kind. So rich I call them now; so smug, so socially jealous. There's Meg Van Dam, now; surely she knows why I have come to her, and she was Milly's friend; yet she fawns upon me. I thought her a great person, but now I know she's eager to rise by hanging at my skirts, and I amuse myself with her joy that I've rejected Ned, as she thinks; with her talk of Strathay, her dismay at John Burke's wooing.