The Beloved Woman

les, as well. Annie was thirty-seven or eight, tall, thin, ash-blonde, superb in manner and bearing. Nature had been generous to her, but she had done far more for herself than Natur

had been presented even in inaccessible Vienna. She spoke languages, quoted poets, had great writers and painters for her friends, and rippled through songs that had been indisputably dedicated, in f

n to shine. Annie's handsome motor-cars bore the family arms, her china had been made in the ancestral village, two miles from Rotterdam, and also carried the shield. Her city home, in Fifth Avenue, was so magnificent, so chastely restrained and sober, so sternly dignified, that it set the cue for half the other homes of the ultra-aristocratic set. Annie's servants had been in the Von Behrens family for y

Von Behrens honours crowded each other-here was the thin old silver "shepherdess" cup awarded that Johanna von Behrens who had won a prize with her sheep, while Washington was yet a boy; and here the quaint tortoise-shell snuff-

eed were they conspicuous among the thousand other p

See here, Margaret," she might add, casually, "do you see the inside of this little slipper, my dear? Read what's written there: 'In these

great locks of Dutch silver, and the laces that had been shown at the Hague two hundred years before, were all confirmed, all reinforced, as it were, by the power and prosperity of to-day. It was no by-gone glory that made brilliant the lives of Hendrick and Anne Melrose von Behrens. Hendrick's cousins and uncles, magnificent persons of title, were prominent in Hol

this goal dimly in the distance, when she stepped from her rather spoiled and wilful girlhood into this splendid wifehood, but even Annie was astonished at the rapidity with which it had come about. M

n inheritance and her husband's great wealth silenced all question there. The Murison pearls and the famous diamond tiara that her father had given her mother years ago had come to Annie, but they were eclipsed by the Von Behrens family jewels, and these were all he

had dutifully cons

agnificent Annie who was quoted as telling Madame Modiste to give her a fitter who would not talk; it was Annie who decided what should be done in recognizing the principals of the Jacqmain divorce, and that old Floyd Densmore's actress-wife should not be accepted. Annie's ne

l upon which she would have based herself if she had known how. Annie's quick positiveness with her servants, her cool friendliness with big men, and clever men, her calm assurance as to which

y independent and energetic person, with small time for languishing airs. She headed committees and boards, knew hundreds of working girls by name, kept a secretary and a stenographer, and mentioned to

ith them, wrapped her beautiful figure in satins and jewels to descend to formal dinners, she was almost as much admired and envied and copied as she might fondly have hoped to be. She managed her life on modern lines of efficiency, planned ahead what she

most unpleasant. But Louison, the wife, upon sufficient pressure, had brought her child to the Melroses, and had doubtfully disappeared, and Theodore had returned from his wanderings to live, silent

were, had met with that most unfortunate accident. For a few years Annie had been utterly exasperated whenever she thought of it. For Christopher was really an extraordinary husband for Alice to hold, even in normal circumstances. H

magnet to her husband's friends, and his home the centre of a real social group. Annie respected her for it, and helped her by flashing into her rooms

the family cap by announcing her engagement to Acton Liggett. Annie smiled to herself whenever she thought of it. When this was consummat

ed strangely to change some of the lives nearest her, Annie went in to have luncheon with her sister. It was a bri

ed Alice lightly on the forehead, and while Freda was coming and going with their meal, the

re alone Annie a

is the matter w

out--? Did s

ys up to his uncle's house, in Westchester, and-as she didn't say one word about being ill-I didn't see her that day, nor yesterday, as it happened, for we didn't come down until n

ll you?" Alice a

ad to be the last of your own generation, and she hoped you and I would always ha

e la

gets so worked

ie went on reasonably, "nobody is tying Mama's hands! If she wants to educate this young girl-this Norma person-to please Kate, or all her children for that matter, she doesn't have to go into hysterics, and send for Judge Lee. She said she didn't

finally admitted that all she really wanted to do was to befriend this niece of Kate Sheridan. Of course Chris and I think Mama has one of her funny notions about it, but if the child's mother ha

with her favourite look of in

d bring her out here to have tea with me some day soon. Mama was delighted, and I think she hopes that a friendship will come of it."

I could get the truth out of Mama in five seconds,

t!" Alice contra

sister said, impatiently. "And coming

hending look. And in lowered tones they be