Even when their schooldays ended and Much-Afraid entered the service of the Shepherd the friendship had not really been broken. By that time Superiority was already smarting inwardly from the constant neglect of Pride and his slowness in proposing to her, despite the fact that his parents had chosen to consider the two engaged since their school days. During his many flirtations with other girls it had soothed her wounded feelings to continue to stand up for Much-Afraid and to insist that it was her horrible relatives who had driven her into the Shepherd’s service, and that no one could blame her for wanting to escape from such a home as hers as soon as possible.

Then, when she went off with the Shepherd to the High Places, the dallying Pride, still without making any proposal to Superiority, had gone off in order to try to force Much-Afraid to return, and had himself returned, not only having failed to achieve his purpose, but now so crippled and scarred of face that he was at long last ready to do what she had so long awaited—to marry her.

Superiority told herself, therefore, that her friendship and gracious championship of Much-Afraid had been properly rewarded. Of course as the wife of Pride she was not tactless enough to speak of her old friendship with the one through whom Pride had experienced such a fall, and there had been no need to do so during Much-Afraid’s absence from the valley. It had been more difficult, however, when she actually returned with a new name, no longer crippled and disfigured, and attended by two regal-looking handmaidens. Undoubtedly this would have been enough to break the friendship at last were it not for the fact that Grace and Glory herself had taken such loving pains to maintain it. She had immediately sought out her friend, had given herself no airs, and had been so affectionately interested in all her friend’s concerns that Superiority had been quite disarmed.

“After all,” she said to herself, “she may be considerably better off than she was before, poor little soul, but my own position is unassailable. I have a husband, lovely children, a beautiful home, and an ample fortune, and my husband is heir to a title. Why should I grudge my friend an improvement in her own fortune? I shall certainly not parade the friendship before my husband, and Grace and Glory shows that she is tactful enough not to do so either. It is just as well, however, to keep in with the Shepherd’s friends and not to make enemies unnecessarily, as poor Pride has already found to his cost.”