Ida had a reception two weeks after her return from her bridal trip, and an elaborate menu was provided by a caterer from New York.  Maria, in a new white gown, with a white bow on her hair, sat at one end of the dining-table, shining with cut-glass and softly lighted with wax-candles under rose-colored shades in silver candlesticks, and poured chocolate, while another young girl opposite dipped lemonade from a great cut-glass punch-bowl, which had been one of the wedding-presents.  The table was strewn with pink-and-white carnations.  Maria caught a glimpse now and then of her new mother, in a rose-colored gown, with a bunch of pink roses on her breast, standing with her father receiving their guests, and she could scarcely believe that she was awake and it was really happening.  She began to take a certain pleasure in the excitement.  She heard one woman say to another how pretty she was, “poor little thing,” and her heart throbbed with satisfaction.  She felt at once beautiful and appealing to other people, because of her misfortunes.  She turned the chocolate carefully, and put some whipped-cream on top of each dainty cup; and, for the first time since her father’s marriage, she was not consciously unhappy.  She glanced across the table at the other little girl, Amy Long, who was dark, and wore a pink bow on her hair, and she was sure that she herself was much prettier.  Then, too, Amy had not the sad distinction of having lost her mother, and having a step-mother thrust upon her in a year’s time.  It is true that once when Amy’s mother, large and portly in a blue satin which gave out pale white lights on the curves of her great arms and back, and whose roseate face looked forth from a fichu of real lace pinned with a great pearl brooch, came up behind her little daughter and straightened the pink bow on her hair, Maria felt a cruel little pang.  There was something about the look of loving admiration which Mrs. Long gave her daughter that stung Maria’s heart with a sense of loss.  She felt that if her new mother should straighten out her white bow and regard her with admiration, it would be because of her own self, and the credit which she, Maria, reflected upon her.  Still, she reflected how charming she looked.  Self-love is much better than nothing for a lonely soul.

That night Maria realized that she was in the second place, so far as her father was concerned.  Ida, in her rose-colored robes, dispensing hospitality in his home, took up his whole attention.  She was really radiant.  She sang and played twice for the company, and her perfectly true high soprano filled the whole house.  To Maria it sounded as meaningless as the trill of a canary-bird.  In fact, when it came to music, Ida, although she had a good voice, had the mortification of realizing that her simulation of emotion failed her.  Harry did not like his wife’s singing.  He felt like a traitor, but he could not help realizing that he did not like it.  But the moment Ida stopped singing,