"Ah, how stupid I am!" she exclaimed. "I could not understand. But if
they always called her Natalie, and me Natalushka--"

She paused for a moment to collect her thoughts.

"Signor Calabressa, what does it mean?" she said, almost wildly. "If one
sends me a locket--'_From Natalie to Natalushka_'--was it my mother's?
Did she intend it for me? Did she leave it for me with some one, long
ago? How could it come into the hands of a stranger?"

Calabressa himself seemed rather bewildered--almost alarmed.

"My little daughter, you have no doubt guessed right," he said,
soothingly. "Your mother may have meant it for you--and--and perhaps it
was lost--and just recovered--"

"Signor Calabressa," said she--and he could have fancied it was her
mother who was speaking in that low, earnest, almost sad voice--"you
said you would do me an act of friendship if I asked you. I cannot ask
my father; he seems too grieved to speak of my mother at any time; but
do you think you could find out who the lady was who brought that locket
to me? That would be kind of you, if you could do that."




CHAPTER XVIII.

HER ANSWER.