The Heiress of Mcgregor by Lucy Ellen Guernsey

MARION waked in the morning with a general impression that something very delightful had happened, but it was some minutes before she could disentangle her recollections. At last, however, it came to her. She was really going away, going to begin the world anew as she had wished. She was going where she would have a chance to show what she could do, and where she would not be looked down upon, and treated like a baby, as she was now.

As she lay and looked round her pretty little room with its old-fashioned furniture almost black with age, the carved cabinet which did duty as a bureau, the looking-glass with its queer frame of black wood and tarnished gilding, the muslin-covered toilet-table which Aunt Baby had dressed up in one of her own old flowered dresses as a surprise for Marion's birthday, she wondered how it would seem to wake in a new place.

"Of course I shall go to work and make my room as pretty as I can. I mean to begin some mats and tidies and a scrap-bag, and have some glasses for flowers. I mean to ask Aunt Baby to let me have father's pictures and hang them up-at least some of them. Perhaps some day I shall have a fine house and picture galleries of my own, and then dear father's works shall be appreciated at last. Of course poor dear Aunt Baby could not be expected to see anything in them."

Then returning to her room: "I shall have my Bible and books of course, and when the little boys come in to see me, as I shall let them when they are very good, I shall read to them and tell them Bible stories. Perhaps I shall get them to have family worship after a while."

Marion lay indulging in these delightful visions till the striking clock warned her that it was time to get up. She had resolved on being very kind and amiable to everybody, so as to leave none but pleasant remembrances behind her. Especially she would be very considerate to Aunt Baby. After all, she had meant to be kind, and had been so according to her lights. As Christian said, the idea of her own superiority was firmly fixed in Marion's mind, especially of her superiority to her own family.

"I suppose Marie must have some new clothes," said Hector McGregor at breakfast. "We must not let her go among her new friends with nothing to wear."

"I don't think you need take any trouble about that, grandfather," said Marion, "I dare say father-I mean Mr. Van Alstine-will provide all that is necessary."

"I dare say Ezra will do what is right, my dear, but I should not like you to begin by asking him for something to wear," said Miss Baby. "Aunt Christian has to go to T- for two or three days. We will just look over your things and see what is needed, and she will buy it for us."

The clothes were looked over, and it was decided that Marion should have a new black silk, a muslin and some other articles of minor importance.

"Don't you mean to send for your summer shawl, Aunt Baby? " asked Marion. "You won't have another so good a chance."

"No, dear; I don't think I shall buy a summer shawl just at present," answered Aunt Baby, quietly. "My old one will do very well for some time yet."

"Well, I wonder how you can bear to wear that old snuff-coloured Canton crape that is as well-known as the meeting-house," said Marion.

And it was not till some hours afterward that she suspected that the price of Aunt Baby's new summer shawl had gone into her black silk. It was not that Marion meant to be ungrateful so much as that she did not think. Her heart was never-

"At leisure from itself" to consider the claims and feelings of others.

"Aunt Baby, I wish you would let me have the key of the east garret," said Marion next day after doctor and Mrs. Campbell had gone; "I want to look at father's pictures."

Miss Baby hesitated.

"Marie dear, I don't think I would touch them if I were you. I don't think you will find any pleasure in them."

"I can tell better when I see them," said Marion, loftily. "I think I have a right to the things which belonged to him, and whatever his faults were, he was my father."

"True, my dear. I would have you respect his memory, and for that very reason I would let the dead rest. However, take ell own way, lassie," she added, as Marion made a gesture of impatience. "Here is the key. Bring it back when you have done with it."

"I suppose I can have some of the pictures to take with me," said Marion; "and the rest can stay here till I have a house of my own."