“The stipulation was exactly in those words.”

“You mean to carry it out?”

“To be sincere?  I do, Percy!

“You mean to marry Algernon Blancove?”

“I should be contemptible indeed if I did, Percy!

“You do not?”

“I do not.”

“And you are sincere?  By all the powers of earth and heaven, there’s no madness like dealing with an animated enigma!  What is it you do mean?”

“As I said—­to be sincere.  But I was also bound to be of service to your friend.  It is easy to be sincere and passive.”

Percy struck his brows.  “Can you mean that Edward Blancove is the man?”

“Oh! no.  Edward will never marry any one.  I do him the justice to say that his vice is not that of unfaithfulness.  He had but one love, and her heart is quite dead.  There is no marriage for him—­she refuses.  You may not understand the why of that, but women will.  She would marry him if she could bring herself to it;—­the truth is, he killed her pride.  Her taste for life has gone.  She is bent on her sister’s marrying your friend.  She has no other thought of marriage, and never will have.  I know the state.  It is not much unlike mine.”

Waring fixed her eyes.  “There is a man?”

“Yes,” she answered bluntly.

“It is somebody, then, whose banker’s account is, I hope, satisfactory.”

“Yes, Percy;” she looked eagerly forward, as thanking him for releasing her from a difficulty.  “You still can use the whip, but I do not feel the sting.  I marry a banker’s account.  Do you bear in mind the day I sent after you in the park?  I had just heard that I was ruined.  You know my mania for betting.  I heard it, and knew when I let my heart warm to you that I could never marry you.  That is one reason, perhaps, why I have been an enigma.  I am sincere in telling Algy I shall take the name of Blancove.  I marry the banker.  Now take this old gift of yours.”

Percy grasped the handkerchief, and quitted her presence forthwith, feeling that he had swallowed a dose of the sex to serve him for a lifetime.  Yet he lived to reflect on her having decided practically, perhaps wisely for all parties.  Her debts expunged, she became an old gentleman’s demure young wife, a sweet hostess, and, as ever, a true friend:  something of a miracle to one who had inclined to make a heroine of her while imagining himself to accurately estimate her deficiencies.  Honourably by this marriage the lady paid for such wild oats as she had sown in youth.

There were joy-bells for Robert and Rhoda, but none for Dahlia and
Edward.

Dahlia lived seven years her sister’s housemate, nurse of the growing swarm.  She had gone through fire, as few women have done in like manner, to leave their hearts among the ashes; but with that human heart she left regrets behind her.  The soul of this young creature filled its place.  It shone in her eyes and in her work, a lamp to her little neighbourhood; and not less a lamp of cheerful beams for one day being as another to her.  In truth, she sat above the clouds.  When she died she relinquished nothing.  Others knew the loss.  Between her and Robert there was deeper community on one subject than she let Rhoda share.  Almost her last words to him, spoken calmly, but with the quaver of breath resembling sobs, were:  “Help poor girls.”