chance to be alone.

But she wasn't to be alone for yet a while. Her mother followed her
and insisted on helping unfasten her dress, turning down her bed,
bringing some witch-hazel to bathe her forehead--a dozen little
pretexts to linger. Mother did not always perform these offices.
Surely she must suspect. Yet, if she did suspect, why her kindness?
Why didn't she speak out, and demand explanations?

Mothers are sometimes so mystifying!

The time for the good night kiss came and went with no revealing
word from either side. The kiss was unusually tender, given and
received. Left alone at last, on her little, moon-whitened bed,
Missy reflected on her great fondness for her mother. No; she
wouldn't exchange her dear mother, not even for the most
aristocratic lady in England.

Then, as the moon worked its magic on her fluttering lids, the
flowered wall-paper, the bird's-eye maple furniture, all dissolved
in air, and in their place magically stood, faded yet rich, lounges
and chairs of velvet; priceless statuettes; a few bits of bric-a-
brac worth their weight in gold; several portraits of beauties well-
known in the London and Paris worlds, frail as they were fair, false
as they were piquante; tobacco-stands and meerschaum pipes and
cigarette-holders; a couple of dogs snoozing peacefully upon the
hearth-rug; a writing-table near the blazing grate and, seated
before it--

Yes! It was he! Though the room was Archibald Chesney's "den," the