passion, and she ought to be placed under proper care. Ask your own kind heart, my dear aunt, if it would not be downright cruelty to turn this forlorn woman adrift in the world without making some enquiry first?'

Lady Janet's inbred sense of justice admittednot over-willingly-the reasonableness as well as the humanity of the view expressed in those words. There is some truth in that, Julian,' she said, shifting her position uneasily in her chair, and looking at Horace. 'Don't you think so too?' she added.

'I can't say I do,' answered Horace, in the positive tone of a man whose obstinacy is proof against every form of appeal that can be addressed to him.

The patience of Julian was firm enough to be a match for the obstinacy of Horace. At any rate,' he resumed, with undiminished good temper, we are all three equally interested in setting this matter at rest. I put it to you, Lady Janet, if we are not favoured, at this lucky moment, with the very opportunity that we want? Miss Roseberry is not only out of the room, but out of the house. If we let this chance slip, who can say what awkward accident may not happen in the course of the next few days?'

'Let the woman come in,' cried Lady Janet, deciding headlong with her customary impatience of all delay. At once, Julian-before Grace can come back. Will you ring the bell this time?'

6

This time Julian rang it. May I give the man his orders?' he respectfully enquired of his aunt.

'Give him anything you like, and have done with it' retorted the irritable old lady, getting briskly on

her feet, and taking a turn in the room to compose herself.

in.

The servant withdrew, with orders to show the visitor

Horace crossed the room at the same time-apparently with the intention of leaving it by the door at the opposite end.

'You are not going away?' exclaimed Lady Janet. 'I see no use in my remaining here,' replied Horace, not very graciously.

'In that case,' retorted Lady Janet, remain here because I wish it.'

6 Certainly if you wish it.

Only remember,' he

that I differ entirely

from Julian's view. In my opinion the woman has no claim on us.'

A passing movement of irritation escaped Julian for the first time. Don't be hard, Horace,' he said sharply. 'All women have a claim on us.'

They had unconsciously gathered together, in the heat of the little debate, turning their backs on the library door. At the last words of the reproof administered by Julian to Horace, their attention was recalled to passing events by the slight noise produced by the opening and closing of the door. With one accord, the three turned and looked in the direction from which the sound had come.

CHAPTER THE ELEVENTH.

THE DEAD ALIVE.

JUST inside the door there appeared the figure of a small woman dressed in plain and poor black garments. She silently lifted her black net veil, and disclosed a dull, pale, worn, weary face. The forehead was low and broad; the eyes were unusually far apart; the lower features were remarkably small and delicate. In health (as the consul at Mannheim had remarked) this woman must have possessed, if not absolute beauty, at least rare attractions peculiarly her own. As it was now, suffering-sullen, silent, self-contained suffering-had marred its beauty. Attention and even curiosity it might still rouse. Admiration or interest it could

excite no longer.

The small thin black figure stood immovably inside the door. The dull, worn, white face looked silently at the three persons in the room.

The three persons in the room, on their side, stood for a moment without moving, and looked silently at the stranger on the threshold. There was something, either in the woman herself or in the sudden and stealthy manner of her appearance on the scene, which froze, as if with the touch of an invisible cold hand, the sympathies of all three. Accustomed to the world, habitually at their ease in every social emergency, they were now silenced for the first time in their lives by

the first serious sense of embarrassment which they had felt since they were children, in the presence of a stranger.

Had the appearance of the true Grace Roseberry aroused in their minds a suspicion of the woman who had stolen her name, and taken her place in the house?

Not so much as the shadow of a suspicion of Mercy was at the bottom of the strange sense of uneasiness which had now deprived them alike of their habitual courtesy and their habitual presence of mind. It was as practically impossible for any one of the three to doubt the identity of the adopted daughter of the house, as it would be for you who read these lines to doubt the identity of the nearest and dearest relative you have in the world. Circumstances had fortified Mercy behind the strongest of all natural rights—the right of first possession. Circumstances had armed her with the most irresistible of all natural forces-the force of previous association and previous habit. Not by so much as a hair's breadth was the position of the false Grace Roseberry shaken by the first appearance of the true Grace Roseberry within the doors of Mablethorpe House. Lady Janet felt suddenly repelled, without knowing why. Julian and Horace felt suddenly repelled, without knowing why. Asked to describe their own sensations at the moment, they would have shaken their heads in despair, and would have answered in those words. The vague presentiment of some misfortune to come had entered the room with the entrance of the woman in black. But it moved invisibly; and

it spoke, as all presentiments speak, in the Unknown Tongue.

A moment passed. The crackling of the fire and the ticking of the clock were the only sounds audible in the room.

The voice of the visitor-hard, clear, and quietwas the first voice that broke the silence.

'Mr. Julian Gray?' she said, looking interrogatively from one of the two gentlemen to the other.

Julian advanced a few steps, instantly recovering his self-possession. I am sorry I was not at home,' he said, when you called with your letter from the consul. Pray take a chair.'

By way of setting the example, Lady Janet seated herself at some little distance, with Horace in attendance standing near. She bowed to the stranger with studious. politeness, but without uttering a word, before she settled herself in her chair, I am obliged to listen to this person,' thought the old lady. But I am not obliged to speak to her. That is Julian's business-not mine. Don't stand, Horace! You fidget me. down.' Armed beforehand in her policy of silence, Lady Janet folded her handsome hands as usual, and waited for the proceedings to begin, like a judge on the bench.

6

Sit

"Will you take a chair?' Julian repeated, observing that the visitor appeared neither to heed nor to hear his first words of welcome to her.

At this second appeal she spoke to him. 'Is that Lady Janet Roy?' she asked, with her eyes fixed on the mistress of the house.