She remembered all at once that at supper the evening before her sister-in-law had said How! to the butler, and had eaten the mayonnaise with a dessert spoon.

But presently, because she saw they waited for her to speak, she said, with a little flutter of maliciousness: "Wouldn't it be well for Richard--he has plenty of time, and we are also likely to have it now--to put us all through a course of instruction for the training of chieftainesses?
And when do you think she will be ready for a drawing-room--Her Majesty Queen Victoria's, or ours ?" "Marion!" said Mrs.Armour severely; but Richard came round to her, and, with his fresh, child-like humour, put his arm round her waist and added "Marion, I'd be willing to bet--if I were in the habit of betting--my shaky old pins here against a lock of your hair that you may present her at any drawing-room--ours or Queen Victoria's--in two years, if we go at it right; and it would serve Master Frank very well if we turned her out something, after all." To which Mrs.Armour responded almost eagerly: "I wish it were only possible, Richard.

And what you say is true, I suppose, that she is of rank in her own country, whatever value that may have." Richard saw his advantage.

"Well, mother," he said, "a chieftainess is a chieftainess, and I don't know but to announce her as such, and--" "And be proud of it, as it were," put in Marion, "and pose her, and make her a prize--a Pocahontas, wasn't it ?--and go on pretending world without end!" Marion's voice was still slightly grating, but there was in it too a faint sound of hope.

"Perhaps," she said to herself, "Richard is right." At this point the door opened and Lali entered, shown in by Colvin, her newly-appointed maid, and followed by Mackenzie, and, as we said, dressed still in her heathenish garments.