it is said that the unexpected generally happens, and the truth of this was borne home to marion during her first week in kensington. she had looked (not without a thrill of delight and fear blended) for an immediate plunge into the excitements of the capital. instead, she found herself, partly by accident and partly by design, passing from hour to hour and day to day in a state of almost complete seclusion. the accident that led to this state of affairs was due to lady fairfax's being a favourite attendant of her majesty; her majesty elected to find herself ailing on the wednesday—the day after marion's arrival—and lady fairfax's presence seemed to be the one factor that made the royal indisposition bearable. aunt constance could only spare rime for an embrace and a half-hour's gossip with her niece before her coach was announced to carry her to court. she came home late in the day with the news that change of air was prescribed by the royal physician, and on friday the queen's household must move to hampton court; and should that atmosphere not prove beneficial, they might go yet further, to tunbridge or bath. lady fairfax had risked the displeasure of her august mistress and prayed for leave of absence, only to learn that the arrivals of 'little nieces' from our duchy of cornwall do not find a place in the calendar of events at court. when our health is improved (it was hinted) we may perhaps find it agreeable to dispense somewhat with our lady-in-waiting. until then—as lady fairfax allowed herself to say, the unfortunate aunt must 'grin and bide.'

so much for the 'accident' that led to marion's seclusion. the 'design' was due to the cherished plans her aunt had formed—vaguely before her arrival, very actively on the night of her coming—for her niece's success. lady fairfax was delighted with her young guest. she was proud of this addition to her family treasures; a veritable jewel, she fondly said. but the jewel must be well set before being displayed to the public eye. to the inquirers visiting the house in kensington or seeing her abroad, lady fairfax smilingly said that her niece had had a trying journey, and must have her beauty sleep—several days' beauty sleep, in fact (during which time it was decreed that my lady's tailor and sempstress should be hard driven). no word of this was hinted to marion. she accepted the fact of her aunt's duties at court as an ordinary event, and spent her time wandering about the great house and garden; noting the grandeur of the entertaining rooms, the numerous liveried servants, and the ordered stateliness of everyday life. her windows looked out on kensington square, where she had glimpses of carriages coming and going, of chairmen setting down their burden at the gates, of men and women of such dress and deportment that marion thought they must surely be the princes and princesses out of some fairy tale.

kind sir john fairfax was concerned for the young lady under his roof. she seemed to him to be moping.

'everything is for the best, on the whole,' declared his wife. 'i am truly grieved to leave her so much, but that would not be a loss if you would bear her company a little oftener. you forget the change this life is to the child. what is garth? a wigwam in a forest. she must needs find her feet before she can run. and run she shall not till she be dressed. romaine is altering a gown for everyday usage,' the lady went on, 'and then as soon as her majesty's malaise allows her to free me, we will have a few visitors some quiet night that i may see how she dances. young beckenham will not be sorry of the chance, and sampson, i'll be bound, for all his languid airs, will be glad to make a leg again in a minuet. then,' lady fairfax smiled demurely, 'in another week or two a ball in the honour of the coming of my niece to kensington. and if you don't like the fuss and the pother of the ball coming on, dear lad, why, get you to whitehall and talk secrets with my lord churchill.'

'you are riding this hobby of her gowns to death!' grumbled sir john. 'it is bad for the girl. she'll think that nothing matters but fal-lals. and she is too much alone. can't her majesty spare you an hour this evening to take her to a play? need she be dressed for her first play?'

the lady neatly dropped a kiss on the end of her husband's nose. 'that's for that!' she smiled. 'you have given me an idea. not to-night, but monday (her majesty has promised me monday) our little niece shall go to the play. she shall wear her white muslin frock and a rose in her hair; and not a woman in the theatre but will be sick at the thought of the pots on her dressing-table.'

sir john looked at his wife in despair, then laughed outright.

'upon my word, connie,' said he, 'you'd have made a fine general. you lose no chances. you make every hummock into a bed for a culverin. i give it up!'

'but even you,' serenely concluded his companion, 'will agree that she cannot walk into her majesty's drawing-room in a muslin frock.'

to do lady fairfax justice, she had no intention of burdening marion with fal-lals, for although in those days women wore most elaborate robes, it was not considered necessary to have a new one for each ball, play, or party they attended. moreover fashion was a sleepy, slow-moving dame, only rising to bestir herself once in a decade—and not, as is her present habit, setting a new step every year, and making her followers miserable if they fall behind in the march. a ball dress was a veritable 'creation,' made with infinite pains and pride, every stitch carefully put in, the embroideries a triumph of patience and skill (and eyesight), as indeed was all the needlework of those leisurely days, before machine-made imitations undermined its value. dresses were worn by their owners year after year, and very often a valued gown was personally bequeathed to the next generation.

lady fairfax had carefully hidden the slight disdain she had felt for marion's belongings when her french sempstress, to whom she had sent an urgent call, came early on the second day after marion's arrival. indeed marion's eyes had watched her aunt narrowly, and the kind-hearted woman had guessed her nervous shrinking when madame romaine lifted from her trunk the simple garment made by the plymouth tailor.

'but, dear heart,' lady fairfax had allowed herself to remark, 'where is your mother's lilac embroidered gown? did not your father give it to you?'

'he never thinks of dress,' faltered marion, feeling that she and her father were being found blameworthy, 'and—i don't think he could bear to see even me wearing my mother's bodices.'

lady fairfax's eyes softened, and a memory came to her of the fair lady of garth in that one winter when she flitted across the stage of london before she 'buried herself' in the west.

the frenchwoman meanwhile was sniffing in the recesses of marion's trunk. 'i have not smelt so great a sweetness, mademoiselle, since i was a small little one—so—playing in the garden of my uncle in avignon, a thousand years ago!'

'all my mother's things still smell sweet,' said marion to her aunt. 'she made her own waters, and grew lavender and roses and all sorts of flowers specially for them. i cannot make them near so well. mistress trevannion says my mother was very beautiful, too. but father will never talk of her, except,' added marion disconsolately, 'to say i do not in the least resemble her.'

the eyes of mistress and sempstress met over the golden brown head. marion at the moment was busying herself with another small trunk, and took from it a japanned box.

'i had almost forgotten this, aunt constance,' she said. 'father gave it to me in the greatest hurry, just when curnow was fastening the boxes. if i had not known his ways, i should have thought he had been angry. but it was just that he did not want me to ask any questions.'

she opened the box with a little gold key. inside was a length of heavy embroidered silk, worked in cream and gold, on a cream ground, with a straying touch of blue and green. pinned to the end of the length was a slip of paper.

'your mother was working this for you, and talking of when you would be grown, just before she died,' ran the words. 'wear it, my child.' nothing more.

'that was a very sweet lady,' emphatically said the frenchwoman as she examined the length, the other two standing silent a space.

'it is most beautiful,' said lady fairfax. then she glanced at the script again, and in spite of marion's solemn look she chuckled a little.

'"wear it!" says my lord. "wear it!" how? pinned on the front of your bodice? i'll warrant my brother is firmly of the idea he has given you a gown. but there's something else in this trunk—another box——'

marion fumbled with the lid, and presently disclosed a casket with a velvet lining. curled in the folds of the velvet lay a necklace of turquoise and pearl.

marion stood speechless.

'i shall never dare wear that!' she said at length.

lady fairfax, with a pleased smile, was turning the necklace about in the light.

'your mother's too, i remember it. this settles the matter,' she added to the sempstress. 'mademoiselle's gown shall be cream and gold, with a soup?on of the blue of these turquoises. let it be designed'—she went off into a string of technicalities. 'you will get master bingon at once, my good romaine, and the two of you set to work. i give you seven days and nights for a month's employment. can you, and will you?'

madame romaine glanced at marion's face. 'solely for les beaux yeux of mademoiselle,' she briefly replied. 'i cannot, but i will.'

'good. and bid the little simone come here for a spell. she can have the small chamber next to mademoiselle, and stitch at her flounces and petticoats, and perhaps persuade mademoiselle to wear her new stays.'

marion laughed. 'i give up the battle from this moment, aunt constance. i will even wear the sort of stays you wish. but not,' she added firmly, 'as hard and tight as yours.'

lady fairfax complacently surveyed her own beautiful figure in the long mirror on the wall.

'la, la, mademoiselle,' put in the frenchwoman, 'il faut souffrir pour être belle.'

'not that kind of suffering, madame romaine!' said marion, with a touch of her father's dryness that made her aunt smile. 'mademoiselle de delauret wears hard stays, and she suffers greatly sometimes, but i have never seen any marked improvement in her looks. but who is this simone who is coming to mount guard over me?'

here the door opened and a page boy entered. he spoke to his mistress, who drew him out of earshot of the others.

'master beckenham again, my lady. master beckenham's compliments, and may he have the pleasure of waiting on your ladyship and inquiring after the health of mistress penrock?'

'did i not tell you what to say should this happen?

'i said it, my lady, and master——'

'go and say it again.'

the page boy made a deep obeisance and withdrew.

lady fairfax, smiling at her own thoughts, rejoined her niece and the sempstress. meanwhile madame romaine, whose delight at finding a receptive audience was great, was telling a story about some one called simone, a protégée of hers whose services in her own house lady fairfax had just requested. simone, it appeared, had been found many years ago on a doorstep in the city—in crutched friars—by the frenchwoman on her way home from a client's house. the sempstress had been minded to pass by—there are always plenty of crying children in the gutters—but she had heard the child babbling in her own tongue. and the kind-hearted woman, whose country was her dear love, picked up the little one, and solely for the sake of la belle france, carried her home.

the child, emaciated, almost starved to death, had fallen into a fever and a severe illness from which she had barely escaped with her life, and not altogether, madame romaine sometimes feared, with her reason. she had babbled of strange things sometimes, but the memory of her childhood seemed to have fallen off, with all the hair from her head, during her illness. 'she is one of my most valued needlewomen,' declared the sempstress, 'which is why, i suppose, my lady demands her presence here, just as if she were but a chair to sit upon, and no good whatever to me!'

'you have others,' placidly said lady fairfax, busy with her powdering box at her dressing-table. 'and i have a certain liking for the little simone. but of course, if you prefer it—i wish not to drive you hardly—send alice hepworthy—but spare us her history. seven days and nights you have. 'tis not wise to waste an hour talking of people who do not matter in the least. marion, my dear,' lady fairfax swung round, 'take warning by romaine, and if ever you find yourself chattering, think of her. she cares not what her subject may be, so long as her tongue may wag. you are an insufferable bore, my good romaine, with your simones and your gutters. begone, you rogue, and let me see your progress soon.'

with a smile and a curtsey the frenchwoman departed. she counted it one of her greatest privileges to be rated by lady fairfax.

madame romaine's little french needlewoman took up her abode in a small chamber that opened off marion's, and when that young lady was not engaged with her aunt or uncle, or the stray visitors she was allowed to see before she was presented to london society, she found simone leblanc very pleasant company.

simone, like elise, had that instinct for dress which is the birthright of all frenchwomen and the envy of their anglo-saxon sisters. did marion require a ribbon in her sunny hair, simone knew by an unfailing instinct just where the knot should fall, found without a second's hesitation the one spot to place a rose. and when marion, seeing herself stumble in these paths so easily tripped by the little french feet, was minded to voice her discontent with herself, simone would reply with her rare smile: 'no, no! mademoiselle deceives herself. mademoiselle has great qualities. as for a little nothing like a bow or an ornament, mademoiselle will surely see that it is one's métier, the placing of bows and ornaments.'

marion liked the quiet, grave girl who sat so industriously hemming the flounces for her petticoats and otherwise filling the gaps her over-tried employer left neglected in the programme of mademoiselle's dresses. sometimes marion would take a needle and help her, and they talked of london, simone offering crumbs for marion's hungering curiosity of the ways of this new world. always when she entered the little chamber she would see the small brown head bent over a lapful of silk and muslins, the dainty hand stitching away, the face, with its look of settled gravity and absorption combined, turning at her entrance.

'if she were not so serious,' mused marion on one or two occasions, 'that little simone would be a beautiful girl.'

but beautiful or not, simone wrought exactly the change lady fairfax had desired. marion unconsciously studied the little sempstress's way of wearing her own simply made gowns: a new spectacle this, for elise's dresses had never been simple. and the grave rebuke in the dark eyes when marion, on seating herself, adjusted a skirt in an unbecoming way had the effect of subduing the young lady at once.

'i don't know what is the matter with me,' confessed marion to her aunt. 'simone makes me feel too large, too clumsy. i haven't got big feet'—she complacently surveyed her projected slipper—'but when simone walks across a room i think i have. i did not think there was anything the matter with my arms till i saw simone's glance if i placed them so. am i very countrified, aunt constance?'

'my little lamb,' said that lady with a fond embrace, 'you are finding your feet. never mind how big they are. they are very well.'

simone had passed triumphantly the test of the shrewd, watching eyes of lady fairfax, who had long ago singled out the quiet girl as being the most deft of the frenchwoman's assistants. and now, as she saw her coming and going about her niece's affairs, she decided that, considering her as a waiting woman, deftness was the least of her qualities. there was something in the ease of the girl's movements no matter in what company she found herself; something in the way she entered a thronged room on some errand, spoke to her young mistress and went out again; something in the restraint of her speech and the subtle charm of her low soft voice, that made lady fairfax congratulate herself again and again on the waiting woman she had found for her niece. and it was a matter of sincere regret in the entire household when madame romaine obdurate for once, insisted on her apprentice's return in order to help with the mass of work that was driving the sempstress into an untimely grave. as soon as the load was eased somewhat, simone might be allowed to return; but in the meantime, excellent needlewomen were hard to find, while waiting women grew in every garden, so to speak. thus madame romaine.

simone's departure, mrs. martin, lady fairfax's woman was obliged to find time to divide her care between two mistresses, and visitors coming more and more to the house, marion's empty hours were few.

true to her promise (being graciously allowed by her majesty) lady fairfax took her niece on the monday night to see the play at the theatre near blackfriars bridge, colonel sampson being the only visitor in the box. when marion had seated herself, and realised that the box was in full view of the body of the theatre filled with people of fashion, she shrank back in uttermost confusion. her aunt, serenely surveying the house, nodding to acquaintances and smiling at the stiff backs of her honest enemies, was forgetful for the moment of her niece's predicament. but the gentleman at the rear of the box came to her rescue. colonel sampson, slipping round her chair, leisurely placed his elegantly garbed shoulder and elbow on the edge of the box, and leaning down to talk to her, sheltered her from the view of the gossiping folk in the body of the theatre. marion vowed friendship for colonel sampson from that moment.

then, when the curtain rose, and her companion returned to his own chair, marion forgot the gay crowd, forgot past, present, and future. leaning on the edge of the box, utterly unconscious of the fact that lady fairfax's 'little niece' in a white muslin dress and with a rose in her hair, was being fully as much regarded as the stage, she gave herself up to the pleasure of her first play. she did not know that her laugh rose here and there the first in the house; she was totally unaware of the horror in her face when the villain of the piece unmasked his villainy. when a duel came to be fought, and swords gleamed out, she half turned and grasped sir john's sleeve, not daring to see the blades clash. and when the curtain fell, she needed the positive assurance of her uncle and colonel sampson (lady fairfax being at the door of the box, smilingly and inexorably keeping visitors without) that the men lying there on the stage were not really dead.