seat. It was a large, old-fashioned, wooden building, many miles from
any neighbors, and here she lived alone--for her only son, a lad of
twelve years of age, was at some northern school. At first I was very
lonely, for the secluded life we led at Holly Grove was hardly in
accordance with the taste of a young girl. Still, I did not mind it as
much as some, for I cared but little for gentlemen's society, and had
frequently declared that I should never marry.

"Toward the last of July, Mrs. Le Vert's brother came to visit her. He
was a handsome, boyish-looking youth, six months older than myself--
just out of college--full of life and very fond of pretty girls,
particularly if they chanced to be wealthy."

"That's a little like Ben," said Rosamond, and Miss Porter continued:

"From the first, Mrs. Le Vert seemed determined to make a match
between us, for her brother was poor, and she fancied it would be a
fine idea to have the Porter estate come into the Dunlap family. So
she threw us constantly together--talked of me to him and of him to
me, until I really began to believe I liked him. He, on the contrary,
cared for nothing but my money. Still he deemed it advisable to assume
a show of affection, and one night talked to me of love quite
eloquently. I had been to a dinner party that day, and had worn all my
diamonds. He had never seen them before, and they must have inflamed
his avarice, for I afterward heard him tell his sister that he never
should have proposed if I had not looked so beautiful that night.
'_I was irresistible in my diamonds_,' he said."

Miss Porter paused a moment to witness the effect of her last words,
but Rosamond was looking over her shoulder at a _wrinkle_ she had just