It might have been noticed, but, as a matter of fact, I am sure hardly anybody did notice, that Gwynne was the only one of the family who figured in the theatricals, or, in the pungent everyday phrase, had anything to do with the Pallinders. Marian Lawrence had been asked to the house party, and had eagerly promised to come, but in a day or so Mrs. Pallinder received a charming, apologetic, and graceful little note from Mrs. Lawrence, declining on Marian's behalf, for some vague reason. The truth is, Mrs. Horace Gwynne, on hearing of the plan, had once again ordered out her barouche and driven over to the Lawrences', upright and stern, with the stark face of Doom. And after a heated conference with the mother, the note had been despatched; Mrs. Lawrence sat down and cried heartily with the disappointed girl when that dire act had been performed--but neither of them thought of disobeying Cousin Jennie. When they met Mrs. Pallinder face to face coming out of church next Sunday morning they were both a good deal flustered; they flinched before Mrs. Pallinder's steadily radiant smile, and were devoutly glad, I think, to escape from her neighbourhood into the crowd. Archie Lewis walked home with Marian, and raised his hat as a carriage spun by--"That was the Pallinders with Miss Baxter," said Archie, observing with a passing surprise that his companion made no sign of recognition. "Was it? I didn't see them," said Marian stoutly, looking straight in front of her with very red cheeks. Not so long before, Mazie had been one of her most intimate friends. Look on that picture, and now on this! What was the matter with all the Gwynnes? Little old Eleanor and little old Mollie, on seeing the colonel less than half a square off, advancing upon them, already uncovered, courtly, bland, with outstretched hand--the two old sisters, I say, fairly took to their heels up a side street, with scared and shrinking faces. They gathered up their virgin skirts and fled shudderingly as from contamination. Mrs. Horace Gwynne, alone of them all, possessed the courage of her convictions. Erect in her barouche, she encountered and returned Mrs. Pallinder's smile with a salute so casual, so perfunctory that it suggested the recognition she would have bestowed upon her cook in event of a public meeting with that functionary. Mrs. Pallinder bit her lips; she reddened through her rouge--and the next moment was gaily bowing to another acquaintance as if life meant nothing to her but this pleasant exchange of civilities. "Of course I never would deliberately _cut_ anybody," Mrs. Horace explained later; "that sort of behaviour is childish and ill-tempered. But I flatter myself I know as well as anyone how to put people in their proper place, and intimate my opinion of them, without talking or acting like a washerwoman. I wanted Mrs. Pallinder to understand that while I was absolutely indifferent to such a matter as the back-rent she owed me