THE BLUE SILK DRESS.

She came and bent over her husband as he was at work, stealing a white arm around his neck, and laying a cheek, all one flush of roses, close to his, as women will when a fit of over fondness is upon them, or when some object of doubtful result is to be attained.

"William, are you angry with me yet?"

"Angry? No; but very busy, Constance," was the rather brief reply, which seemed curt and strange after her caressing tones.

The young wife drew back a little, and a sense of rebuff sent a momentary pout to her lips.

"After all," she resumed, tightening her arm around his neck again, "after all, I haven't enjoyed it very much. The dancing is splendid; but what is the use of that when I cannot dress like other people, and look like other people when I am dressed?"

"I thought your dress pretty enough," Sterling answered, laying down his graver; for there was no use in attempting to work with that white hand so near his lips.

"Yes, just for once; but one cannot go on turning old silks forever, especially when there is but one to turn. Besides, William, I wish you could have seen the difference. Why, the other ladies swept along with the soft, low sound of a wave coming in when the sea is calm, their silks were so subtle and rich; but mine rattled like dead leaves every step I took. It almost made me cry to feel the difference, dear."

"I dare say that you were, in fact, prettier than any of them."

"Of course, I was; you may be sure the men thought so. One read that plain enough in their eyes."

"Constance!"

She started a little, for his tone was sharp with rebuke, but turned the subject with a mellow laugh, delightfully reassuring.

"How I do love to tease you, darling. Indeed, indeed, I did not look in the face of a single man in the class. Why should I, when that which is dearest and most beautiful to me in all the world was absent? But I could see those proud girls glance at each other and smile knowingly, as if I had no business to breathe the same air with them—the stuck-up things."

"The what, Constance?"

"Dear me, I am always putting my foot—There it is again. How tedious it all is."

"You see, my girl, that something more than a new dress is wanted before those proud girls you speak of will recognise you as an equal," said Sterling, with a gentle smile.

"But they shall—they shall! Oh! how I would like to ride over them and trample them down!"

A wild light came into her eyes; she clenched and unclenched her hand almost savagely.

Sterling looked at her, half amused, half wonderingly; a hot rose-color burned in her cheeks, and her red lips curved like a bent bow. She really looked as if it would give her pleasure to trample some one to the earth in making an upward path for her impetuous feet.

"But why do you wish it, Constance? These thoughts are unfit for a poor man's wife."

"A poor man's wife! But I shall not always be that."

"I hope not, dear; but there will be long waiting and much work before you can hope for anything else."

"Long waiting and much work," she repeated, impatiently. "I don't care for work; but waiting, that I will not undertake for—why, it would eat up half one's life."

"Still, Constance, the great secret of success is in knowing how to wait, and when to act."

"But I won't wait. Why should the youth of one poor girl be given up to impatient hopes, while others enjoy? I tell you, William, it is unfair."

"Have you no present? Is my love—the entire devotion of one true heart nothing?" questioned Sterling, speaking low, but with intense and most painful reproach in his voice. "Has it come to that between us so early, my wife?"

"Of course, I didn't mean that," she answered, and tears flashed up through the angry light in her eyes. "You are a dear good fellow, and I love you—oh! ever so much; but other people have lots of things besides love. Now don't they?"

"And, among other things, you want a new dress?"

"Yes, dear; and something else. Don't look cross now; but let me cover your eyes while I tell it."

She laid one of her pretty hands softly over his eyes, surprised his lips with a kiss, soft as the fall of a rose-leaf, and whispered hurriedly, "There is to be a grand ball, something wonderfully beautiful; and I want to see it so much."

"A ball—a public ball! Who on earth put that into your head, Constance?"

She pressed her hand closer to his eyes, though he attempted to shake it off, and stopped his speech with kisses warmer and more eager than the one by which she had prepared him for this audacious request.

"It isn't _very_ public, you know; the tickets are so high that common people cannot get them."

"Then how are we to purchase them?" questioned the husband.

"Only this once; but I do want to see it awfully. Besides, I did not calculate on going with you. People might think that strange, not knowing the truth as we do, and—and——"

The girl was beginning to blush and stammer painfully, for by this time Sterling had forced her hand from his eyes, and was gazing, with a look of stern perplexity, into hers.

"What does all this mean, Constance?"

"Nothing, nothing at all, if you are going to be angry about it. Father has got a ticket, and would take me, if it were not for you. But you are cross as fire, and won't let me enjoy myself even with my own father."

"Why, child, you did not even mention your father."

"But I do now."

"And he wishes you to go with him to this ball?"

"Yes, he does; and I can't tell him why it is impossible. Oh, dear! this having a husband and master in secret is a trial!"

"Yes, it must be a terrible trial, if you can feel it so."

"But I don't—only just a little now and then. Well, it is settled nicely about my going; but the dress—father will give me something toward it; but he hasn't the least idea how much a stunning silk will cost."

"Well, Constance, if you must go, I will work night and day before you shall want proper garments."

"Oh, you darling! you precious old boy! how I love you. What shall the color be—blue, cherry, amber, scarlet, with a long, long train sweeping back ever so far?"

Sterling smiled. The young creature's pleasure was so fresh and genuine that he could not help sharing it a little.

"I think it shall be blue."

"Light blue, then?"

"Yes; just the tint of the sky when you see a break in some storm-cloud."

"And scarlet flowers in my hair?"

"No; moss-roses of a delicate pink, or white if——"

"No, no. Let me have pink roses, if it is not to be scarlet—something a little stunning, you know; but you must give me lots of money—father will never dream how much it costs."

"I will do my best, Constance."

"Hark! what is that? Some one by the door."

Constance ran to her seat, and fell to work with great vigor, calling out in a natural voice for the person who knocked, to come in.

The door opened gently, and Rhoda Weeks came in, with her basket, half emptied of its matches, on one arm, and a note in her disengaged hand.

"Here, Mr. Sterling, this is for you," she said, giving him the note. "I promised your mother—though I didn't know as she was your mother till now—promised to give it into your own hand, and here it is. She wants an answer right away."

Sterling took the note, which was in a very common envelope, but daintily sealed, with a crest stamped on a drop of pale green wax, and read it through without looking up; but his eyes grew troubled as they glanced from line to line; and at last he folded the note with slow hesitation, and cast an appealing look on Constance, who was regarding him with sidelong glances from beneath her drooping lashes as she pretended to work. She caught the look, and feeling that something was expected of her, arose and went close to her husband.

"What is it?" she said, in a low voice. "Any bad news?"

"It is from my mother," he said, gently.

"Oh! is that all?"

She spoke almost insolently; and the gesture with which she flung away from him would have been coarse in a less beautiful person.

Young Sterling loved his mother dearly, and this gesture stung him like a taunt upon the being be held most sacred. He turned suddenly upon his wife, pale to the lips, and answered her in a voice she was not likely soon to forget.

"No, it is not all. My mother is in great need of money, and I have none to send her, unless—"

"Well, unless what?"

"Unless you will release me from my promise, and give up the dress."

"Give up the dress? I, and the ball, too—for that goes with it. William Sterling, I would not do it to save her life."

The last vestige of blood left Sterling's face. She could see that his very hands were quivering with suppressed pain.

"But she needs this money. It is a matter almost of life and death with her."

Constance turned upon him angrily, but her eyes fell on Rhoda Weeks, and she curbed herself.

"Rhoda," she said, "you can go up stairs. Mr. Sterling will send the answer."