"About--your mother?" she asks, quickly.

"It is so. Lady Ruth, you have heard me speak enough of my past to
realize that it has been a lonely life. My father loves me after his own
fashion, and I--respect him deeply; but all my life I have longed for
the love of a mother, until it has reached an intensity you can hardly
comprehend. Now I have received certain news that gives me a wild hope."

"I, too, lost my mother when young, and that circumstance enables me to
feel for you."

Her tender eyes thrill him as he never yet has been touched; the bond of
sympathy is akin to love; he has never had a confidant, and human nature
yearns to unbosom itself.

"I promised to tell you the story, Lady Ruth. If I were sure we would
not be interrupted, I would be inclined to speak now, for I am about
starting upon a mission, the result of which Heaven alone can foresee."

His earnestness impresses her ladyship; trust a bright girl for bridging
over a trifling difficulty such as this.

"There is a little private parlor attached and generally empty," she
suggests, artlessly.

"Just the ticket," he boldly exclaims.

In a few minutes they are seated alone in this bijou parlor; its
decorations are quaint, even barbaric in their splendor, and a lover