I think I saw the dawn that day on which the ball was to be. Whether I did or not, the morning was still very gray and cold when I crept out of my bed and stole to the wardrobe to look at our two dresses. There they hung, carefully displayed upon shifting such as were used in old-fashioned presses: one soft white muslin; the other of that pale apple-green shot silk which had belonged to mother in the days of her youth, and which I had been allowed to make up for the occasion. We had worked at them for days.  
Joyce was clever at dress-making: she was clever at all things that needed of fingers. She had fitted me with my frock, and we had both worked together. But now the dresses were finished, the last had been in; there was nothing more to do, and the day wore away very slowly till evening.
 
At last the hour came when it was time to dress, and such a washing of faces and brushing of hair as went on in that little for half an hour no one would believe.
 
Joyce insisted on "finishing" me first. She coiled up my hair at the back of my head, brushing it as as she could, and laying it in two thick bands on either side of my temples. It never will look very neat, it is such vigorous unruly hair, this red hair of mine, and to this day always has tendrils escaping here and there over forehead and neck. But she did her best for it, and I was pleased with myself. I was still more pleased with myself when I got on the green shot silk with the lace . Joyce said she was surprised to see what a change it made in me. So was I.
 
My skin was very pink and white wherever it was not spoiled by , and the green of the frock seemed to show it up and make the red lips look redder than ever. It is true that my neck and arms were still with the of youth, but then my figure was slim too, and my eyes were black with excitement, and shone till they were twice their usual size. I thought, as I looked in the glass, that I was not so very plain. Yes, I was right when I had begged the shot silk. Joyce could wear anything, but I, who was no "fine bird" by nature, needed the "fine feathers."
 
I was pleased with myself, and I smiled with satisfaction when Joyce declared again that she was quite surprised to see what a good appearance I had. "If you would only keep yourself tidy, Margaret, you have no idea how much better you would look," said she.
 
It was what Deborah was always saying, but I did not resent it from Joyce—she was gentle in her way of saying it; and I remember that I promised I would brush my hair smooth in future, and wear my collars more daintily. I do not believe that I kept to my resolution, but that evening I was not at all the Margaret of every-day life as I surveyed myself in the glass.
 
"But come," said I, hurriedly—half ashamed of myself, I do believe—"we shall be late if we don't make haste. Do get on, Joyce."
 
Joyce began brushing out her long golden hair—real gold hair, not faint flaxen—and coiled the smooth, shining bands of it round her little head. It was a little head, such as I have seen in the pictures of the painted by Italian painters of long ago.
 
"I sha'n't be long," said she.
 
I sat down and watched her. She would not have let me help her if I had wanted to do so. She would have said that I should only disarrange myself, and that I should be of no use. Certainly nothing was wanted but what she did for herself, and she did it quickly enough. When she stood up before the mirror—tipped back to show the most of her person, for we had no pier-glasses at the Grange—I do not believe that any one could have found a thing to improve in her. Her figure looked taller and slenderer than ever in the long white dress, and the soft little folds of the muslin clung tenderly around her delicate shape, just leaving bare her neck and arms, that were firm and white as . Her face was flushed as a May rose; her lips were parted in her anxiety to hasten, and showed the little even white teeth within. Her blue eyes were clear and soft under the black .
 
She moved before the glass to see that her dress was not too long, and back her slender throat, upon which she had just clasped mother's delicate little old-fashioned gold necklace with the drops of yellow beryl-stone. It was the only bit of good jewellery in the family, and Joyce always wore it, it became her so well.
 
"Come now, Meg," said she, "I am quite ready. Let's go and see if we can do anything to help mother."
 
We went down-stairs. Deborah was there in mother's room waiting to survey us all. She had just fastened mother's dove-colored satin gown that had served her for every party she had been at since she was married. Mother had just the same shaped cap on that she always wore; she never would alter it for any fashion, but that night the frill of it was made of beautiful old lace that she kept in blue paper and lavender all the rest of the year. I thought she looked splendid, but Joyce was not so easily pleased.
 
"Dear mother, you really must have another gown before you go anywhere again," said she, shaking out the skirt with a dissatisfied air. "This satin has lost all its stiffness."
 
Mother looked at it a little anxiously herself, I remember, when Joyce said this. We considered Joyce a judge of dress and the fashions, and of course the 's ball was a great occasion. But she said she thought it did very well for an old lady, and indeed so did I, although that may perhaps have been because I was very anxious to be off.
 
Dear mother! I do not think she gave much thought to herself; she was taken up with pride in us. Yes, I do believe that night she was proud even of me.
 
She smiled when Deborah, with her hand on the door-knob, said, patronizingly, that although she did not hold with bare arms and necks for modest females, she never would have thought that I should have "dressed up" so well. Mother bade her begone, but I think she was pleased.
 
"Dear me!" said she, looking at me. "I buying that silk. It must have been in '52, when father took me up to town to see the Exhibition. It was cheap for the good silk it is. It has made up very well."
 
She turned me all round. Then she went to her jewel-case, unlocked it, and took out a row of red coral .
 
"That's what you want with that dress," said she, fastening them round my throat. "And you shall have them for your own. Red-haired women ought to wear coral, folk say. Though for my part, I always thought it was putting on too many colors."
 
How well I remember my pleasure at that gift! Joyce wanted to persuade me not to wear them; she said the pale green of the frock was prettier without the red beads. But I wouldn't listen to her; I was too pleased with them, and I do not believe that it was owing to gratified vanity; I think a little of it was pleasure that mother thought my appearance worth caring for.
 
I should not have thought it worth caring for myself two days ago, and I should not have cared whether mother did or not. But something had happened to me. Was it the sight of Joyce and her lover that had made me think of myself as a woman? I cannot tell. All I know is that when we walked into the squire's ball-room a quarter of an hour afterwards, I felt my face flame as I saw his gaze rest upon me for a moment, and I longed most to be back again in my high-necked homespun frock, with no corals round my throat at all. So inconsistent are we at nineteen!
 
Fortunately my self-consciousness was soon put to flight by other more emotions. There was a fair sprinkling of people already when we got into the room, and more were arriving every moment. Mr. Farnham and the sister with whom he lived were going busily about welcoming the squire's guests almost as though they were the host and hostess themselves: he was the Conservative member. A quiet, inoffensive old gentleman himself, who would have been nothing and nobody without the squire; but blessed with a most officious lady for relative, who took the whole neighborhood under her wing.
 
She rather annoyed me by the way she had of trading on the squire's support of her brother. He supported her brother because he was a Conservative, not at all because he was Mr. Farnham, or even Miss Farnham's brother.
 
Poor Mr. Broderick, I dare say, if the truth had been known, he must often heartily have longed to get rid of them. But the old thing was a good soul in her way, if it was a , loud-voiced way, and was very active among the poor, although it was not always in the manner which they liked.
 
She and mother invariably quarrelled over the advantages of soup-kitchens and clothing clubs; for mother was every bit as as Miss Farnham, and being an old-fashioned woman, liked to do her charity in a more personal fashion.
 
I looked with and amusement upon their meeting to-night. Miss Farnham had an aggressive sort of head-dress, with nodding artificial flowers that seemed to look down scornfully upon mother's old lace and soft frills. She had not seen me for some time, and when mother introduced me as her youngest daughter, she took my hand firmly in hers, and held it a while in her uncompromising grip while she looked at me through and through.
 
"Well, I never saw such a thing in my life!" exclaimed she presently, in a loud voice that attracted every one's attention.
 
I blushed. I was not given to blushing, but it was enough to make any one blush. I thought, of course, that she was to my , in which I had felt so shy and awkward from the moment that I had entered the ball-room, from the moment that I had felt the squire's glance rest upon my neck and arms.
 
She dropped my hand.
 
"The very image of him," said she, turning to my mother.
 
"Yes, she is very like her father," agreed the mother.
 
"Why, my dear, the very image of him," repeated the creature. "Got his temper too?" asked she, turning to me again.
 
"I don't know, ma'am, I'm sure," answered I, half amused, but still more annoyed. "I dare say."
 
"Oh, I'll be bound you have, and proud of it too," declared she, shaking her head emphatically. "Girls are always proud to be like their fathers."
 
"I don't suppose it'll make any very particular difference who I'm like," said I. "Things will happen just the same, I expect."
 
Miss Farnham laughed and patted me on the back.
 
I do not think she was an ill-natured woman, although she certainly had the talent of making one feel very uncomfortable.
 
"Well, you're not so handsome as your sister," added she. "But I don't know that you hadn't better thank your stars for that."
 
With that she turned away from me and sat down beside mother, arranging her dress comfortably over her knees as though she meant to stay there the whole evening.
 
The people kept coming fast now. The squire stood at the door shaking hands as hard as he could. There was the old village doctor with his pretty granddaughter, and the young village doctor who had inherited the practice, and had just married a spry little wife in the hope of making it more important.
 
And then there was the widow of an officer, who lived in a solid brick house that stood at the corner of the village street, and had two sons in the ship business in town. And there was the mild-eyed clergyman with his delicate young wife, who had more than enough babies of her own, and was only too thankful to leave the babies of the parish to Miss Farnham or any one else who would mother them.
 
She was a sweet little woman, with a white face and soft silky hair, and she wore her wedding-dress to-night, without the slightest regard to the fact that it was made in a somewhat elaborate fashion of six years back, and was not exactly suited to her figure at that particular moment. She sat down between mother and Miss Farnham, and must have been cheered by that lady's remark to the effect that she looked as if she ought to be in her bed, and that if she did not retire to it she would most likely soon be in her grave.
 
I left mother and went up to greet Mary Thorne, who had just come in with her father. He was a great, strong, florid man, rather shaky about his h's, but very much the reverse of shaky in any other way; shrewd and keen as a sharp knife or an east wind.
 
I don't know that I ever to him but this once in my life. Father had such an overpowering aversion to him that we were not allowed to keep even the daughter's acquaintance long after this, but he made that impression on me: that there was only one soft spot in him, and that for the motherless girl, who was the only person allowed to contradict him.
 
She contradicted him now.
 
The squire had gone up to receive them bluntly enough, even I could see; but the squire might be allowed to have an aversion to the man who was going in as a to contest his Conservative's long-occupied seat, though indeed I believe his dislike to the manufacturer was quite as much, because he had bought up one of the old places in the neighborhood with money earned in business. I fancy the Thornes were only invited that night as old friends of Frank Forrester's, and I don't think Frank was thanked for the necessity.
 
"You must have had a rare job, Broderick, this old place up," he was saying as I came up; "all this dark oak, so gloomy looking!"
 
"Oh, papa, how can you!" laughed his daughter. "Why, it's what everybody admires; it's the great sight of the whole neighborhood."
 
"Yes, yes; I know, my dear," answered Mr. Thorne; "you mean to say that we should like to live here ourselves. Well, yes, I should have bought the place if it had been in the market, but—"
 
"But you would have done it up," broke in the squire, all over; "whereas there's been nothing new in the since—"
 
He stopped.
 
I fancied that he was going to say, "Since I brought my bride home;" but he said, after a pause, "since my father died."
 
"Well, to be sure, I do like a bit of brightness and color," acknowledged Thorne, whose fine house, although in excellent taste, was decidedly ornate and splendid; "and it is more suited to festal occasions."
 
"There, papa, you know nothing about it," declared Mary, emphatically. "I declare I never saw the Manor look better. Those flags and garlands are beautiful."
 
"Oh, my nephew Frank did all that," answered the squire, carelessly; "he likes that sort of thing."
 
"Captain Forrester?" repeated the girl, with just a little smile on her frank, fresh face. "Well, it does him credit then. It isn't every one would take so much trouble."
 
"He likes taking trouble," said I. "Just look at the trouble that he has taken over our concert."
 
"He likes playing first-fiddle," laughed Miss Thorne, gayly, her face—that was too rosy for prettiness, although not too rosy for the perfection of health—flushing than ever as she said it; "I always tell him so."
 
I did not answer. Mr. Thorne and his daughter moved on, and I looked round the room in search of the captain. The place did look very beautiful, although I do not think that I should like now to see its severe proportions and splendid wood wainscoting disfigured by flags and garlands. We were dancing in what used long ago to be the ' refectory. The house had been built on the site of a part of the monastic buildings belonging to the abbey, and this portion of the old had been retained, while the remainder of the house was in Tudor style. I heard the squire explaining it to the new parson, who had lately come to the next parish. I had heard him explain it before, or I do not suppose that I should have known anything at all about it.
 
"I suppose you consider it shocking to be dancing in any part of the ?" I could hear him say, laughing; "but it isn't so bad as a friend of mine who gives balls in what used to be the ."
 
The parson was a young man, with a sallow, shaven face and very refined features; the expression of his mouth was gentle, almost tremulous, but his eyes were dark and .
 
"I'm not quite so prejudiced as that," he said, laughing also, "although I do wear the cloth."
 
"That's right," said the squire, heartily. "We have the of a thirteenth-century chapel of the purest period in the grounds, and we don't that even by a school-feast. You must come and see it in the day-time."
 
Father came up at that moment. He was dreadfully like a fish out of water, poor father, in this assembly, and looked it. The squire, in a hasty fashion, introduced him to the . Cyril Morgan, and passed on to shake hands with a portly wine-merchant, who had lately from business in the neighboring town, and had taken one of the solid red-brick houses that were the remnants of our own town's .
 
This gentleman introduced his wife, and she had to be introduced to the company, and the host's hands were full. Father moved away with the parson. He looked rather disgusted at first, but the young man looked at him with a smile upon his gentle mouth and in his dark eyes, and said, diffidently, "I have heard a great deal of you, Mr. Maliphant—the whole neighborhood rings with your name. I am proud to meet you."
 
Of course, I liked that young man at once, and as I went to sit down again beside the mother and Joyce, I was pleased to see across the room that father and the Rev. Cyril Morgan had entered upon a conversation. But, to tell the truth, I soon forgot him; I was too busy looking about me.
 
I could not help wondering where Captain Forrester could be, and I was quite angry with Joyce for being so and seeming to care so little. She seemed to be quite with the Hoad girls, who sailed in, followed by their father, just late enough to be fashionable, and to secure a good effect for their smart new frocks.
 
I am afraid I was not gracious to the Hoads. I could not be so gracious as Joyce, who took all their patronizing over the concert in the utmost good faith. I turned away from them, and continued my search for Joyce's admirer. I disliked them, and I am afraid that I showed it.
 
But they passed on, Bella, who was the better-looking of the two, pursued by two town-bred youths asking for a place on her card; Jessie, the elder, talking with an old lady of title from the town, who wished her to sing at a charity concert.
 
They seemed to be very much engrossed; nevertheless, when presently the band struck up the first waltz, they, as well as many other people in the room, turned round to look who was dancing it. They put up their long-handled eye-glasses and fairly stared; for, as soon as the music began, the squire had walked up to my sister and had asked her to open the ball with him.
 
Mother blushed with pleasure and triumph; her dear blue eyes shone. She did not say a word, but I know that if she had spoken she would have said that she was not surprised.
 
I was not surprised either, but I was very much annoyed, and I was not at all in a good temper with Captain Forrester when, two minutes afterwards, he appeared coming out of the with Mary Thorne upon his arm. What had he been about? No wonder that his face clouded when he saw that he was too late. But it was his own fault; I was not a bit sorry for him. Mary Thorne was laughing and looking up half-defiantly in his face. She looked as if she were saying one of those rough blunt things of which she was so fond; and she might well say one at this moment to Captain Forrester, although I scarcely supposed it could be on the topic on which he deserved it.
 
Could she possibly be chaffing him on having missed the first dance with my sister? No; for she had had no opportunity of noticing his devotion to her. She dropped his arm and nodded to him merrily, as much as to bid him leave her—as much as to say that she knew there might be better sport elsewhere. And after a word in reply to what she had said, he did leave her and came across to me.
 
There was a troubled, look on his bright face, which was scarcely accounted for by the fact that he had missed a dance with Joyce. He greeted me and sat down beside me without even asking after father. We sat and watched Joyce float round in the strong grasp of the squire, but I do not think that we were either of us quite so pleased at the sight as was mother, upon whose face was joy unalloyed.
 
She was simply genuinely proud that the squire should have opened the ball with her daughter. I think she would have been proud of it had there been no deeper hopes at the bottom of her heart. But there were deeper hopes, and as I watched Joyce that night I remembered them.
 
In the excitement of watching the romance that I had fancied developing itself more quickly and more decisively than I had even hoped, I had at first quite forgotten my fears about the squire wanting to marry Joyce. They had not occurred to my mind at all until that afternoon two days ago, when he had talked so about Frank's position. But now, as I watched him with her, the notion which I had rather refused to entertain at all before took firmer shape.
 
I was a............