living here in the heart of the Abbey, if no one called upon her or took any notice of her? Polly was not of a patient nature; it did not occur to her even that there was still time for the courtesies she had set her heart upon gaining. She had looked every day for some one to come, and no one had ever come; no one had made any advances to her at the Abbey, which was the only place in which she could assert her position as a lady and a Chevalier’s wife. Even Mrs. O’Shaughnessy, who had risen from the ranks, who lived next door, who was not a bit better, nay, who was much less good than Polly to begin with (for what is a trooper’s wife? and she had been nothing but a trooper’s wife)--even Mrs. O’Shaughnessy had passed the door as if she did not see it, and had waited outside till Miss Lottie came to her. Polly’s dreams had been very different. She had seen herself in imagination the admired of all admirers; she was by far the youngest of all the Chevaliers’ wives, and the gentlemen, at least, she was sure would rally round her. Women might be spiteful, but men always did justice to a woman when she was handsome and young. Was not that written in all the records? She expected that the ladies would be spiteful--_that_ would be indeed a part of her triumph. They would be jealous of her superior attractions, of her youth, of her husband’s adoration of her; the old things would be in a flutter of alarm lest their old men should come within her influence. But Polly had felt pretty sure that the old gentlemen would admire her and rally round her. To make the women envious and the men enthusiastic, was not that always the way? certainly such was the course of events in the _Family Herald_. The heroine might have one friend devoted to her fortunes, a confidant more admiring, more faithful even than her lover; but all the rest of womankind was leagued against her. And so it had been in most of the novels Polly had read. But that neither men nor women should take any notice, that was a thing for which she was not prepared, and which she declared to herself she would not bear.