to be the cause of difficulty with your mother, still I hope it may
be arranged.

In closing I must add how happy I was at the evidence of your blood.
But that, I now see, was a certainty. You will have to forgive us
for a large measure of blindness. Affectionately,

AMELIA VIGNE LOWRIE."

Almost instantaneously Linda was aware that she would visit the
Lowries. She liked the letter extremely, as well as all that she
remembered of its sender. At the same time she prepared for a scene
with her mother, different from those of the past--with the recourse
to the brandy flask--but no less unpleasant. They had very little to
say to each other now; and, when she went into her mother's room
with an evident definite purpose, the latter showed a constrained
surprise, a palpable annoyance that her daughter had found her at
the daily renovation of her worn face.




XVIII


Linda said directly, "I met Miss Lowrie, father's sister, at a
concert last week, and this morning I had a letter asking me to stay
with them in Philadelphia."

Mrs. Feldt's face suddenly had no need for the color she held poised