She's got a postal card album, and she hasn't anything in it from
Canada. Ellen! Come downstairs, honey; Ma'Lou Jackson has brought
you something pretty."

But even as she called up the stairway, and heard the quick
response from above, it crossed Mrs. Kendrick's mind that her
daughter would not be willing to put these postal cards in her
album, for she would be ashamed to tell from whom they came.

She was annoyed when Ellen came flying down the stairs, her thin,
blond hair all about her shoulders, and caught both the
newcomer's hands--the mother feared for a moment that she would
kiss her old playmate.

"And then if somebody saw it through the window, and went and
told young Emery Ford or Mr. Hyatt, I don't know what on earth I
should do," reflected the careworn matron.

"Mamma, do come and look at these lovely postals," Ellen cried
effusively a little later, as her mother, plainly ill at ease,
passed through the room. "I'm going to pull out those that Cousin
Rob sent me from Texas, and put these in right after the
California ones. See here, mamma; isn't this one beautiful?
Ma'Lou was there a week. She's put a little cross over the hotel
where they stayed."

Mrs. Kendrick looked at the strong, well-developed figure of her
guest, and a certain dull anger arose in her mind. Why did health
and money both go to this inferior creature, when they were
lacking in higher quarters? Perhaps this prompted her query;