Lowton the life of a dog.

"Did I hear voices and laughter this afternoon?" she demanded, one evening, when her granddaughters came to bid her a dutiful good night.

"'Twas but Mary Warburton and Lady Limerick, who came to inquire after the health of their beloved cousin," said Prue demurely.

"No one else? It seemed to me that a dozen times, at least, the door was thundered at as though a queen's messenger demanded entrance."

"In very truth, your ladyship's penetration is marvelous!" cried Prue eagerly. "Her Majesty most graciously bade Lady Limerick inquire the latest news of 'the dear countess' gout'—and also, if my duties at your bedside left me leisure to attend the court."

"And, pray, what answer did you make?" Lady Drumloch inquired suspiciously.

"In good faith, I was put to it for excuses, since I had admitted the favorable change in your symptoms, and received the congratulations of many anxious friends," returned Prue pathetically. "'Tis true I have no heart for frivolous pleasures while my dear grandmother is ill—but the court is another thing, and people begin to wonder at my absence."

"Well, what is the matter? Why make excuses at all? I am not aware that I have imposed any restrictions upon you," said the old lady crisply. "Lowton has taken very good care of me for a year, and you may still venture to trust me to her for a few hours. 'Tis news to me that you should be so averse to 'frivolous pleasures' that you need make me an excuse for giving them up."

"Indeed, dear Grandmother, it was no vain excuse—'twas the truth," Prue protested. "Yet not the whole truth, for my baggage is still at Bleakmoor, whence we fled in such a hurry that we brought naught away with us but what we traveled in!"

"Well? Are there no milliners and mantua-makers in London?" inquired the countess, with an air of surprise.

"Several hundred, I should think—and every one of them threatening me with the law's worst penalties for debt! The wretches! they were eager enough to fling their wares under my feet, when they believed me rich—or likely to be. But now—never a mercer or tailor will trust me for a gown!"

"What! not with the prospect of a husband in Parliament?" cried her grandmother, laughing maliciously.

"Indeed no, Grannie," sighed Prue piteously; "not unless I pay, at least, for what I order now."

"They have learned wisdom at last," retorted Lady Drumloch coldly, "and that is more than can be said of you, who during four or five years of widowhood have jilted half the peerage, made yourself the byword of the court, and now go in fear of the debtors' prison!"

"There was no talk of a debtors' prison for me when I was Queen Anne's favorite lady-in-waiting," said Prue, with a touch of arrogance, "but now they only remember that I was banished from court—"

"And that the rich lovers you jilted have married other women, while you are still 'the Widow Brooke,'" Lady Drumloch interrupted.

"But they will change their tone when they find that the queen has forgiven me," said Prue, ignoring her grandmother's last thrust, "and now she has sent me such a gracious message by Lady Limerick—but, alack the day!—what am I saying? How can I present myself before Her Majesty without a decent gown to my back? Oh, Grandmother—" She fell on her knees, and would have clasped the pale, slender hand that lay on the coverlet. But Lady Drumloch drew back out of her reach and regarded her with resentful eyes.

"Well?" she queried in her driest voice. "What do you propose to do? You have a plan, no doubt, to accomplish what you have set your heart upon."

"No—I have no plan," cried Prudence despairingly, "but surely you, dear Grandmother, will not let your little Prue lose her last chance of winning back the queen's favor, for lack of a few guineas to buy a gown!" and once more she tried to get possession of the reluctant hand.

But Lady Drumloch pushed her away with such force, in her anger, that she almost overturned her on the floor. "I thought I should soon come at the cause of all your pretty speeches, you false jade!" she shrieked. "Is it not enough that I give you shelter in the home you have disgraced with your reckless follies, that I have to admit your wanton companions—only Mary Warburton and Lady Limerick, forsooth! Do you think I am so deaf as not to have heard the voices of half a dozen men, and your dear friend, Barbara Sweeting, sharer and inspirer of half the mad frolics that have made you notorious?—but I must pay your debts and give you money, when I'm so poor I can only afford one woman to wait on me, and can not go out for an airing because a carriage is too great a luxury for me—even a hired one! C'est honteux—c'est infame"—and the angry old woman, who seldom lapsed into French, except in moments of great agitation, burst into hysteric cries and weeping, at which Lowton hurried in, and the girls, with scared faces, fled.

"She is much worse than she used to be," whispered Peggie. "Formerly, when you asked for money, she used to tell you to go to the devil, and scold you roundly—but she gave it after all. And now—I do not think she will."

"If she waits until I ask her, she certainly never will," said Prudence proudly. "To-morrow I will go to old Aarons—though I vowed the last time should be the very last."

The girls were still lingering upon the staircase, listening to the soothing murmurs of Mrs. Lowton and the outcries of the invalid, gradually sinking into whimpers, when a loud knocking announced the arrival of a visitor of importance, and James presently came up with a petition from Sir Geoffrey Beaudesert for a few words with the Lady Prudence, notwithstanding the lateness of the hour.

"The lateness of the hour! Why, 'tis barely nine o'clock," cried Prue, blushing and sparkling with delight. "Go, James, and tell Sir Geoffrey I will be with him immediately. Come, Peggie."

And away she flew to reassure herself, by a glance at her mirror, that her scene with Lady Drumloch had not dishevelled her luxuriant curls, and to disguise the shabbiness of her gown with a lace kerchief and a knot of ribbon.

"A plague on all milliners and tailors," she pouted; "to think that I should have to receive my betrothed after three weeks' separation, looking more like my lady's scullery-maid than her granddaughter."

"Sir Geoffrey will never know what you wear, if you sit away from the lamp, where he can just see your eyes by the firelight," counseled Margaret. "No man cares to look at your gown, who can see your face."

"Flatterer!" cried Prue; but she kissed her cousin on both cheeks, and certainly gave no sign of doubting her veracity.

Sir Geoffrey was impatiently waiting in the dim drawing-room, where James had reluctantly lighted a pair of candles in an ancient silver sconce that Benvenuto Cellini himself may have chiseled. The two ladies swept the most ceremonious of curtseys, but at the sight of Prue's radiant loveliness, her visitor dropped on one knee, and taking both her little hands in his, kissed first one and then the other with unaffected ardor.

"How have I lived