She wore the rich brocaded silk that her uncle had sent her a year ago from Paris, and which she had laughingly declared then should be her wedding-dress. Its rich shining folds trailed far behind her, and the soft folds of the bridal veil fell over it like a mist. Her wreath and the knots of flowers that looped up her dress were of natural orange blossoms, the gift of her lover. Their fragrance pervaded the room deliciously. She wore a magnificent set of diamonds, the bridal gift of Captain Ernscliffe. Young, beautiful, elegantly attired, she made a picture on which the eyes might feast and never grow weary, and none would have guessed how heavy was the heart beating under the satin corsage, or that the fearful elements of a tragedy had been woven into that life that seemed yet in its earliest spring. Her father looked at her a moment, then silently opened his arms, and she as silently glided into them, heedless that the bridal veil was disarranged as she laid her fair head down upon his breast. "Papa," she murmured, with quivering lips, "_you_ love me, you are kind to me in spite of--of--all." "God bless you, my little daughter," he said, solemnly, and touched his lips lightly to her brow. It was the first time he had kissed her since she had come back. He had forgiven her, and been kind to her, but the loving caresses that had been showered on the little Queenie who went away had never been given to the Queenie who returned. This silent, gentle kiss seemed to have all the solemnity of a farewell. "Papa, I feel strangely," she said, putting her hands to her brow; "my head whirls, my--oh! oh! God, oh, God, what is that?" With a wild and ringing shriek of horror she tore herself from his arms, and stood pointing at the window with one jeweled finger, her blue eyes dark and dilated, her face transfigured with terror. That frightened shriek penetrated to Georgina's room across the hall. The bride and her mother and sister all made a rush for Queenie's room, apprehending some dire calamity. They found her standing in the centre of the floor, her face transfigured with terror, her shaking finger pointed at the window, while she wailed aloud in accents of remorse and despair: "_The dead! The dead!_" "Queenie, Queenie, you rave!" her father exclaimed, catching her arm as she held it forward, still pointing at the window. She turned around and clung to him, sobbing wildly: "A ghost was there, papa--a horrible ghost!" "No, no, dear, there was nothing--I saw nothing. Queenie. There is no one at the window," he answered soothingly. She gave a fearful, shuddering look at the window. "It is gone, now, papa; but I tell you I saw a ghost at the window--one from the dead came and looked at me--_his_ ghost, papa," she moaned, hiding her face on his shoulder. "Whose ghost was it, Queenie?" asked Georgina, curiously, as she stepped forward in her elegant bridal robe. "Whom did you see?"