"You said I could ask her, mother. I did ask her--you let me ask her. I asked her first--before Dolly asked Allen--you said I could"--over and over again; but Dolly's flashing silence was more impressive. Pearl knew that it was not so much a question of justice as of trial by torture. Mrs. Conway would yield to whichever of her children could inflict the most pain upon her, and that, of course, was Dolly. Dolly did not reiterate her position like Antonia. Now and then she dropped a frigid sentence that revealed her argument. Her mother had always told her she might ask anyone she liked for week ends. She had asked Allen and he had accepted. As for Olive, she lived in Southampton--why shouldn't she stay in her own house? It was just as an excuse for little girls to sit up talking all night and steal food out of the pantry and get the whole household upset. This was shrewd. The last time Olive had come to stay it had resulted in the loss of a cook. Mrs. Conway remembered this as Dolly spoke. Her position was painful. She had promised Antonia she could have her friend this Sunday, when Olive's parents were away. But then on the other hand she had also encouraged Dolly to ask anyone she liked to the house. Yet she disliked young Williams and feared Dolly's growing devotion to him. Somebody had already said to her that it was a pity for Dolly to make herself so conspicuous with him--he was no good, that young man. But part of her tragedy as a mother was that she sympathized with her children when thwarted in something in which she knew they ought to be thwarted. She knew now that Dolly's hold on young William's interest was of the slightest; she knew that the girl had obtained this promise of a week end visit with difficulty--perhaps even it was mere convenience--he wanted to go to some party, or to see some other woman. Mrs. Conway knew that if she decided in favor of Antonia, as perhaps strict justice would demand, there never would be any other week end for Williams. Dolly would lose him; and though this was exactly what she desired, she could not be so cruel as to bring it about. So she decided in favor of her elder daughter, and managed as usual to anger both of them. "I'm afraid, my dear," she said to Antonia, as if she were being particularly impartial, "that this is one of those terrible occasions on which you are called upon to be unselfish and noble and all that. I own I don't care for this young man who says bur-r-rud and wor-ruld, and seems to me to be quite the dullest person I ever met; but Dolly is older than you, you know, and must be allowed to have her playmates first. When you are a big girl and want to have beautiful young morons to stay----" "I hope I shan't ride roughshod over other people's rights," said Antonia with snapping eyes.