The discovery of her dependence upon her step-mother marked an end to one period of Joan's existence: the apathetic period. Heretofore she had allowed their daily life, their amusements, their acquaintanceships, to remain in the hands of Effie May. If that lady chose, as she naïvely put it, to "break into society," and society was willing, Joan was amenable, though a little dubious as to society's taste. She was amenable, that is, so long as she was not called upon too actively to assist in the process. Pride forbade her making any effort to interest or to be interested in people who chose to accept the present Mrs. Darcy as one of themselves. To the Louisville she knew so far, she was merely the appendage of her parents, a captive chained to the triumphal chariot-wheel of her step-mother. That was all very well so long as she knew that she might snap the chain at any moment and be free. But a dependence that seemed likely to continue indefinitely was not to be borne by what the Major would have called "the proud spirit of a Darcy." Joan, waking in the early dawn, rose and dressed (not in negligée), demanded breakfast at an hour when the astonished servants were barely awake themselves, and proceeded to clear her decks for action.... Ellen had sowed a useful suggestion in her brain. There was one freedom open to all young girls who were not too exacting in their demands: the freedom of marriage. Joan decided to marry. She also selected the victim. It was the first time she had thought of him for weeks; or of "the girls," those heart's companions with whom she had shared for two years her inmost hopes and desires (to say nothing of hats and gloves and handkerchiefs); with whom at parting she had exchanged vows of lifelong fealty. Their letters had accumulated unanswered. In the shock and shame of her father's marriage, she had put away childish things, among them her schoolmates, who seemed in the retrospect immature and puerile. Even Eduard of the interesting past had been put away for the moment with outgrown things, and had remained (fortunately) unthanked for his parting flowers. As for the love-letter which had accompanied them--Joan wondered with a start of dismay what had become of it. She found it neatly smoothed of its tell-tale wrinkles (the reader will remember that for a day and a night it had reposed against Joan's heart), filed among the letters in her desk, where it had been duly placed after being duly read, doubtless, by one of Mrs. Darcy's efficient housemaids. The girl studied it with a more dispassionate eye than she had brought to its first perusal: My flowers must tell you what I dare not, dearest little girl of my heart. You will understand why I cannot say good-by. Truly, "to part is to die a little." Forgive me!--EDUARD.