she felt herself drifting. How black the room was--as black with
her eyes open as it was when they were shut! And the silence--it
was like a cloak. There was absolutely no sound. She was in
another world from that which she knew. She thought of this
fair-haired Florence and of Alfred; and, wondering about them,
she dropped to sleep.

When she awakened the room was bright with sunlight. A cool wind
blowing across the bed caused her to put her hands under the
blanket. She was lazily and dreamily contemplating the mud walls
of this little room when she remembered where she was and how she
had come there.

How great a shock she had been subjected to was manifest in a
sensation of disgust that overwhelmed her. She even shut her
eyes to try and blot out the recollection. She felt that she had
been contaminated.

Presently Madeline Hammond again awoke to the fact she had
learned the preceding night--that there were emotions to which
she had heretofore been a stranger. She did not try to analyze
them, but she exercised her self-control to such good purpose
that by the time she had dressed she was outwardly her usual
self. She scarcely remembered when she had found it necessary to
control her emotions. There had been no trouble, no excitement,
no unpleasantness in her life. It had been ordered for her--
tranquil, luxurious, brilliant, varied, yet always the same.

She was not surprised to find the hour late, and was going to
make inquiry about her brother when a voice arrested her. She