Certainly Miss Pauline Lefroy is right. Life at Nutsgrove under the new rÉgime, so far as creature-comforts go, is a vast improvement on the old. Its contrast was at first too great to be entirely satisfactory to the nerves of Colonel Lefroy's unsophisticated daughters; but this feeling soon wore away, and they dropped naturally and contentedly into the reign of order and methodical respectability inaugurated by Mr. Armstrong's well-trained servants. They learned to answer to the chime of bell and gong, to enter a room quietly, and, above all, to dress, as ladies are supposed to dress, neatly and becomingly. The dogs followed the example of their mistresses, and no longer dragged their muddy paws across fresh carpets and waxed boards, or rested their dusty bodies on the drawing-room couches.

"How changed it all is!" thinks Addie. "Sometimes I wonder if I'm myself at all, if I haven't been changed with the carpets and curtains."

With a sort of rueful satisfaction, of struggling content, she looks at herself, at the elegant young person in rustling brochÉ which the swivel pier-glasses so importunately reflect whenever she crosses her luxurious bedroom. Can she be the same light-hearted girl who stood in a ragged cotton dress and patched boots but a short year ago before a cracked fly-stained old mirror?

"In those days," she thinks, with a laugh, "why, the prospect of a new dress would keep me awake for a week! And now!—now that I have as many as I like, now that I could have a ruche of bank-notes at the bottom of each skirt if I wished—I don't seem to care about it or anything else in particular. I suppose it is always the way. They say a confectioner feels as little inclination to eat one of the buns crowding his counter as an apothecary to swallow a box of his pills. It's a pity that possession should bring satiety so soon. I have all I once longed for in plenteous measure, and yet I want something else—something else I once had and did not value in the least. How foolish of me to want it now, just because it's out of my reach! I suppose that's the reason—because it's out of my reach. Oh, why can't I take the good things in my way like Pauline and the others? Pauline! What a wonderful girl she is, and how little I knew her before! I thought she would be a regular whirlwind in this model establishment, would be always kicking over the traces; on the contrary, she has toned down quicker than any of us, though indeed, for the matter of that, we've behaved as a family very creditably on the whole—we, a flock of hungry sheep turned suddenly from a region of bare sun-dried rocks into a rich clover-valley. Yes, we have behaved well; we have not betrayed our jubilation in uncouth gambols or childish caperings, and credit is due to us, I think. I suppose it's the race-horse strain, as Bob calls it, that has supported us under the ordeal—the race horse strain, the Bourbon blood, the Lefroy breeding," she goes on, a little impatiently. "I wish Bob did not talk quite so much about them. I know we come of a good old stock—we're descended from Charlemagne's sister, and all that; but I do think he makes too much of it. Not that Tom minds it a bit, but I fancy sometimes that he laughs at Bob—yes, I feel sure of it—and despises him a little too for his incapacity and what he, I suppose, calls 'bragging.' And yet how handsome Bob is, how noble-looking even! What an air of grand monarque there is about his lightest movement! For all that, I suppose some people would call him 'a conceited young prig.' I wonder would there be any truth in it if they did? Oh, dear, I feel awfully at sea lately about things, everything getting topsy-turvy, and no one to set me straight—no one!"

The master of Nutsgrove intrudes but very little on the lives of his womenfolk. Every morning at nine o'clock, after a hasty preoccupied breakfast, he either drives or rides to Kelvick, scarcely ever returning before the dinner-hour, when he always appears, clothed in broadcloth and courtesy, to lead his sister-in-law in to dinner; after which he generally bears them company for an hour or so in the drawing-room, occasionally taking a hand at bÉsique or go-bang, sometimes standing by the piano like a gentleman at an evening party, turning over music and expressing polite satisfaction at the extremely mild entertainment, both vocal and instrumental, provided by Addie and Pauline; though the former has a sweet little voice enough, but perfectly untrained and husky from want of use. After ten o'clock, when he retires to his study for a couple of hours' reading, they see him no more until the morning.

The hours of his absence between breakfast and dinner are pleasantly filled, the mornings being devoted to study, under the superintendence of an experienced finishing-governess, who keeps Pauline and Lottie hard at work until twelve; after which, three times a week, masters for music and drawing, from whom Mrs. Armstrong also condescends to take lessons, attend from Kelvick.

The afternoons are spent in driving or riding, in returning or receiving calls; for the county people, who had by degrees dropped the neglected children of Colonel Lefroy, are suddenly and unanimously inspired with feelings of civility toward the wife of the wealthy manufacturer, and day after day the trim well-weeded avenue is marked with the track of some county equipage en route for Nutsgrove, a state of things which affords much satisfaction to Pauline and her elder brother.

"By Jove, Addie," exclaims that young gentleman one Saturday afternoon, while turning over the contents of her card-tray, "you are in the swim, and no mistake—Lady Crawford, Mr. and the Misses Pelham-Browne, General Hawksley, Sir Alfred and Lady Portrann, the Dean of St. Margaret's, and Mrs. Vavasour, the Dowager Countess of Deenmore and—do my eyes deceive me?—no—Admiral and Mrs. Beecher of the Abbey, Greystones. I'll trouble you for a half-glass of sherry, Goggles. Thanks. I feel reasonably convalescent now. Admiral and Mrs. Beecher of the Abbey, Greystones! After that, I feel equal to anything!"

"We weren't at home on the day they called," laughs Pauline. "I was so sorry, for I meant to have faced them gallantly."

"Well, Addie, well," exclaims Robert triumphantly, "wasn't I a good prophet? Didn't I tell you how it would be? Didn't I tell you you'd open the gates for him and give him the run of the county—eh? I expect he's precious glad now he didn't let you slip through his fingers, Addie!"

"He doesn't care a straw," she answers contemptuously—"I know he doesn't. He wouldn't care if he had the run of twenty counties unless he liked the people personally—unless they were clever, or amusing, or took an interest in his affairs."

"Stuff, Addie, stuff; you don't know what you are talking about. Armstrong is just as pleased as Punch that the neighbors are looking you up. I saw it in his face at once. Why else did he give up three afternoons in the last fortnight to return those calls with Pauline and you, I should like to know?"

"He did that because it would not have been the thing for me, a bride, to return the first time without my—my husband; it would have been bad form, but it bored him awfully—I saw it did," she persists; "and he did not care for the people either. He was awfully disgusted with Lady Crawford—at the way she talked and the questions she asked me. He said afterward that he would not allow his wife to be patronized by such a meddlesome ill-bred woman as that."

Robert flushes angrily.

"That's because he does not understand. People of his class are always hunting up affronts, imagining they're being snubbed and patronized, when nothing of the kind is intended. I am perfectly certain that Lady Crawford meant only to act kindly in offering advice to you, a young girl unaccustomed to the etiquette of matronhood, without a mother to put you in the way of doing things."

"No," declares Addie, "she meant nothing of the kind. The way she looked at me through her gold-rimmed glasses, turned me round, commented on my dress, my appearance, my appointments altogether, and then informed me calmly that she thought I should do, was, to say the least of it, extremely impertinent and underbred; and I quite agree with my husband in the matter."

Robert and Pauline exchange a rapid glance: there is a storm-signal in the latter's eyes. So Robert wisely lets the matter drop, and busies himself with the card-basket.

"By the bye, Addie," he resumes, half an hour later, when the "breeze" has passed, "about this contemplated return of your husband to Parliament at the next election—I hope you will use your influence to make him fall in with the views of the electors; they are most anxious he should stand—"

"My husband returned for Parliament!" she interrupts quickly. "I—I did not know, have not heard anything about it. They want him to stand for Kelvick?"

"Yes, when old Hubbard retires at the end of the next session; he's been past his work for years. Fancy Armstrong not telling you anything about it! Why, every one is—"

"He does not talk much of his business affairs at home. I suppose he does not think they would interest me," she says hastily.

"Well, but this is not business exactly; and let me tell you, Addie, it's a subject in which you ought to take an interest. The position of the wife of a member of Parliament is always one to command respect, though it is a great pity Armstrong should go to the wrong shop for his politics. However, I suppose, having risen from the ranks, he could scarcely at the eleventh hour go over to Toryism—"

"Because he married a Lefroy? Well, scarcely! And I'd rather not ask him to do so, if that is what you mean, Robert," says Addie, with a slight sneer, which she finds it difficult at times to repress when discussing her husband with Robert. Then, after a pause—"Fancy his going into Parliament! I never thought he had any inclination for a political career."

"Oh, but, my dear," says Robert, with lofty indulgence, "you must not judge Armstrong by what you see of him here! He's not the sort of man to shine in society, not a carpet-ornament by any means; but he's just the man to prose away in the House by the hour anent artisans' rights and working-men's wrongs, and the rest of it! Why, he's one of the tallest talkers at mechanics' institute meeting, union soirÉes, corporate gatherings in Kelvick! You should just hear him in the chair! Why, he has a flow of steady municipal oratory that would simply surprise you! I must smuggle you into the gallery some evening, Addie, and you can hear your lord spout."

"And me too, Bob," pleads Lottie, who is listening most attentively. "I should like to hear Tom in the chair too; I'm sure he has very little to say in any of our chairs. Polly and I have to do all the talk of an evening; he's generally as quiet as a mouse. And, as for toning him down, polishing him up—you remember, Bob, what you said we should have to do when he married Addie? Why, I really don't see there's any need for it all! Tom is quite as polite and as well behaved as any one else who comes here."

"Lottie, Lottie, what are you talking about?" breaks in Bob, his face reddening unpleasantly. "I never said anything of the kind!"

"But Bob, you did—you know you did—and so did Polly, too; but you forget. You said we should have to teach him how to enter a room, to sit at table, eat his dinner, and behave like a gentleman. You said he'd put his knife in his mouth instead of his fork, drink his soup like an alderman, sop up his gravy with bread, and so on. And he does nothing of the kind; he just eats his dinner like you, or me, or any one. I watched him carefully from the very first night. Polly, Polly, you're kicking my shins! Oh, oh! What's the matter? What have I—"

"The matter!" cried Polly, in a low angry voice. "The matter is that I strongly suspect you'll end the year at Miss Swishtale's; and I sincerely hope it may be so."

"Oh, Polly, I'm so sorry!" whines Lottie, looking at her eldest sister walking away quickly with very bright cheeks and a sparkle in her eyes as of unshed tears. "But I never can remember she's married to him; they're not a bit like husband and wife—you know they're not—and she's always Addie Lefroy to me."

"Then let me once more impress on you the fact that she's not Addie Lefroy, and never will be again," says Pauline, with impressive impatience. "And you, Bob, ought to be more guarded in what you say, and not criticise her husband as freely as you do. I can see she does not like it."

Addie walks slowly down the hall, seeing her husband—the door of his study standing ajar—writing at his desk. She pauses for a moment, moves on hesitatingly, and then hurries forward and knocks briskly.

"It is you! Pray come in, Addie," he said politely, rising to meet her. "Won't you sit down?"

"No, I won't detain you; I see you are busy. I—I only came to tell you that Bob has just informed me that you have some idea of standing for Kelvick at the next election, and he—he seemed to think it strange I had heard nothing about it from you."

"But I have no denned idea of standing for Kelvick, and the election is many months off yet. I should certainly have spoken to you on the matter, had I begun to think seriously of it myself. It is not too late now. What are your views? Are you as anxious as your brother Robert that I should go in for senatorial honors?" Then, with a quick cold smile, seeing she does not answer—"Would you care for the mystic initials 'W. M. P.' after your name, my dear?"

"'W. M .P.'! What do they stand for?"

"'Wife of member of Parliament.' Haven't you read 'Our Mutual Friend'? No? Then you ought to do so; it's a capital book."

"If you went into Parliament," she says slowly, "you would have to spend a couple of months in town, would you not—would have to tear yourself away from the bosom of your family for nearly a quarter of a year at a time? That would be a—a trial you ought to consider, I think."

"I will consider all the drawbacks and advantages of the position carefully, before I commit myself, you may be sure. I will not—"

"Do anything in a hurry again," she puts in quickly, her eyes smoldering. "You are right. It would be a mistake."

He takes not the slightest notice of the taunt; she, looking defiantly, wistfully into his strong swarthy face, lit up with that smile of genial indifference it always wears when by rare chance they find themselves alone together, acknowledges to herself with a pang that she is bruising herself in vain, that no movement of her restless, petulant little hand will move him from the position he has taken, that no frown, no laugh, no tear, no sigh, will soften the granite of his face or nature, or bring his life nearer to hers again.

"What is your programme for the afternoon?" he asks, in a tone of polite interest. "It is a pity not to avail yourselves of this pleasant weather, with bleak November within a week of our heels."

"We were thinking of riding over to Beeton Hall—Robert, Polly, and I—to see Mrs. Morgan's apiary, I think she called it; it ought to be amusing. I know I always enjoyed the monkey-house at the Zoo better than anything else."

Armstrong's shield is lowered for a minute; he looks up into his wife's childish face with a smile that brings back to her the short warm fortnight by the sea, and makes her mutter to herself:

"How almost nice-looking he would be if he always smiled in that way! I suppose I must have said something startlingly idiotic to make him look natural all of a moment like that."

"'Apiary'?" he repeats. "Did you expect to see monkeys in Mrs. Morgan's apiary, Addie?"

"Apes?" she answers stoutly. "Of course we did—Polly, Robert, all of us. We expected to see monkeys, apes, chimpanzees, gorillas even; she said it was a splendid one. What are we to see, Tom?"

"Bees, Addie."

"Bees," she echoes blankly—"only bees! I do call that a 'sell,' and no mistake! Going to ride nine miles to see a lot of stupid old bees! Oh, won't the others be just mad! And Polly and I after stuffing our saddles with sugar and nuts and eau-de-Cologne—oh, dear!"

"I sympathize with you, my dear; and I think Robert might have remembered enough of his Latin to know that apis means 'bee.'"

"Such a long uninteresting ride too along the quarry road!" she grumbles. "I—I suppose you wouldn't be tempted to join our festive party, would you?"

"Unfortunately I have to return to Kelvick. I'm engaged to dine with Challice the banker."

"At his club?"

"No; at his private residence."

"Oh, I see! I suppose you'll have a very pleasant evening?"

"I hope so. By the bye, I think I'll remain at the factory all night. They generally keep it up rather late at the bank-house. Challice is an indefatigable whist-player."

"Miss Challice, is she a good player?"

"Very fair; she plays a steady hand."

"I—I suppose now she'd know that an apiary wasn't an ape-house?"

"I never had occasion to sound her knowledge in the matter; but I should say she would."

Addie draws a quick resentful breath, leans over her husband as he is placidly stamping his letters, and whispers in his ear:

"What a pity you didn't marry her, Tom, instead of me!"

With this parting shot she flies from the room.