It was all one to Mollie, and Mr.and Mrs.
Walraven acquiesced in every wish of the Welshman.
The hour fixed for the ceremony was ten o'clock.

It was nearly nine, and up in her own room the bride stood, under the hands of her maid, robed for the sacrifice.
It was a sacrifice, though giddy Mollie had never thought it so before.
Now, when it was too late, her heart began to fail her.
He was dreadfully old, this stately Sir Roger.

She didn't care for him in the least, except as she might care for some nice old grandfather; and then there was Hugh Ingelow--handsome Hugh! But at this point Cricket caught her breath and her thoughts with a gasp.
"Mollie, Mollie, Mollie! How dare you, you wicked, crazy girl! Thinking of Hugh Ingelow, when you oughtn't to remember there's another man alive but Sir Roger Trajenna! I wouldn't marry poor Hugh when he wanted me--a lucky escape for him--and I'm not going to pine away for him now, when it's high treason to do it" "Hurry, Margaret," the bride said aloud.

"Make me just as pretty as ever you can." The three rejected suitors had been invited to the bridal hall, and, singular to relate, had come.
But their discomfiture had been so singular altogether that perhaps they thought it as well to match Mollie in coolness.
There they were at least, regarding one another in the oddest way, and Mrs.Walraven, gorgeous in amber moir, sidled up to her cousin, and hissed venomously in his ear: "So the vicious Guy Oleander has lost his little game, after all! Blue-eyed Mollie is destined to be 'My Lady,' in spite of his teeth." "'There is many a slip'-- you know the proverb, Madame." It was all he said; but his sinister smile, as he moved away, said a great deal.
Hugh Ingelow, very pale, stood leaning against a marble column, all wreathed with festal roses, not as white as his own handsome face.
"What are they plotting, I wonder ?" he thought.

"No good to her.