already sealed.

Then very suddenly she opened her eyes and stared around.

"Eve!" gasped her father, "what have you been doing?"

Vaguely the troubled eyes closed, and then opened again. "I
was--trying--to show people--that I was a--rose," mumbled little Eve
Edgarton.

Swiftly her father came running to her side. He thought it was her
deathbed statement. "But Eve?" he pleaded. "Why, my own little girl.
Why, my--"

Laboriously the big eyes lifted to his. "Mother was a rose," persisted
the stricken lips desperately.

"Yes, I know," sobbed her father. "But--but--"

"But--nothing," mumbled little Eve Edgarton. With an almost superhuman
effort she pushed her sharp little chin across the confining edge of
the blanket. Vaguely, unrecognizingly then, for the first time, her
heavy eyes sensed the hotel proprietor's presence and worried their
way across the tearful ladies to Barton's harrowed face.

"Mother--was a rose," she began all over again. "Mother--was a rose.
Mother--was--a rose," she persisted babblingly. "And Father--g-guessed
it--from the very first! But as for me--?" Weakly she began to claw at
her incongruous bandage. "But--as--for me," she gasped, "the way I'm
fixed!--I have to--announce it!"