Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: . a sma/l, cloaked woman, who kept her fact concealed, crept to the bride's side , . , JHEN Mistress Bellairs, the toast of Bath " for wit and beauty"—and one of the richest matches in the kingdom besides—consented to marry Mr. Stafford, it was a nine days' wonder. True, he was a prodigious buck, and her name had been connected with that of many a less eligible suitor. Nevertheless, " Why does she do it ? " was the question on every lip. And, indeed, it was the question that the pretty little widow was asking herself as she sat warming her slippered foot before a cosy wood fire on the eve of her wedding day. The reason she had given to the world at large, " that it had become absolutely necessary for her to have a protector," had taken in nobody—least of all herself. Kitty Bellairs was right well capable of taking care of herself, and, moreover, enjoyed the process. The reason she had given to Miss Lydia, her tirewoman (a personage, by the way, who highly disapproved of the intended alliance), had been received by that respectfully irate damsel with a sniff that spoke volumes of scepticism. " The poor fellow, Lydia ! He is so desperately enamoured : I had not the heart to say him nay." " Yes, ma'am. There's others besides yourself have always told me he was a feeling gentleman." Mistress Bellairs averted her head from the challenging flame of Lydia's eye. She knew all about the little French milliner in Quiet Street; she did not choose to have the story again. And now, surveying in a melancholy manner the toes of her small pointed shoes in the flickering firelight, with the dusk of the October evening pressing close round her, she could find no excuse for her own folly. Upon one side or the other she could scarce plead entrainement. She had been flattered b...