There was one who would willingly have shared Margaret's work, and that was Evelyn Selby; but her place was in the world's battle-field, and she kept to her post bravely. Fern, in her perfect happiness, often thought tenderly of the girl to whose noble generosity she owed it all; but for some years she and Evelyn saw little of each other. Fern often heard of her visits to the cottage where her mother and Fluff lived. She and Mrs. Trafford had become great friends. When Evelyn could snatch an hour from her numerous engagements, she liked to visit the orphanage where Mrs. Trafford worked. Some strange unspoken sympathy had grown up between the girl and the elder woman. Evelyn's brave spirit and dauntless courage had carried her through a trial that would have crushed a weaker nature. Her life was an uncongenial one. Often she sickened of the hollow round of gayety in which Lady Maltravers passed her days; but she would not waste her strength by complaint. But by and by, when she had lost the first freshness of her youth, and people had begun to say that Miss Selby would never marry now, Hedley Power crossed her path, and Evelyn found that she could love again. Mr. Power was very unlike the bright-faced young lover of her youth. He was a gray-haired man in the prime of middle-age, with grave manners, and a quiet thoughtful face--very reticent and undemonstrative; but Evelyn did well when she married him, for he made his wife a happy woman. "Evelyn is absurdly proud of Hedley," Lady Maltravers would say; "but then he spoils her, and gives her her way in everything." Every one thought it was a pity that they had no children; but Evelyn never owned that she had a wish ungratified. She contented herself with lavishing her affection on Erle's two boys. To them Aunt Evelyn was a miracle of loveliness and kindness; and the children at the orphanage had reason to bless the handsome lady who drove down often to see them. "I do think Evelyn is happy now," Fern said one day to Erle, when they had encountered Evelyn and her husband in the Row. "Of course she is," he would answer; "much happier than if she had married your humble servant. Hedley Power is just the man for her. Now, dear, I must go down to the House, for Hugh and I are on committee;" and the young M. P. ran lightly down-stairs, whistling as he went, after the fashion of Erle Huntingdon. Yes, Hugh Redmond represented his county now, and Fay had her house in town, where her little fair-haired sons and daughters played with Erle's boys in the square gardens. The young Lady Redmond would have been the fashion, but Fay was too shy for such notoriety, and was quite content with her husband's admiration. And well she might be, for the face that Hugh Redmond loved best on earth was the face of his Wee Wifie. THE END. End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Wee Wifie, by Rosa Nouchette Carey