but to set the three faces side by side in her thoughts, to remember
the differences of manner, mind and character. Garratt Skinner was the
master in the conspiracy, the other two his mere servants. It was he who
to some dark end had brought Barstow down from London. He loomed up in
her thoughts as a relentless and sinister figure, unswayed by affection,
yet with the power to counterfeit it, long-sighted for evil, sparing no
one--not even his daughter. She recalled their first meeting in the
little house in Hobart Place, she remembered the thoughtful voice with
which, as he had looked her over, he had agreed that she might be
"useful." She thought of his caresses, his smile of affection, his
comradeship, and she shuddered. Walter Hine's words had informed her
to-day to what use her father had designed her. She was his decoy.

She lay upon her bed with her hands clenched, repeating the word in
horror. His decoy! The moonlight poured through the open window, the
music of the stream filled the room. She was in the house in which she
had been born, a place mystically sacred to her thoughts; and she had
come to it to learn that she was her father's decoy in a vulgar
conspiracy to strip a weakling of his money. The stream sang beneath her
windows, the very stream of which the echo had ever been rippling through
her dreams. Always she had thought that it must have some particular
meaning for her which would be revealed in due time. She dwelt bitterly
upon her folly. There was no meaning in its light laughter.

In a while she was aware of a change. There came a grayness in the room.
The moonlight had lost its white brilliance, the night was waning. Sylvia
rose from her bed, and slowly like one very tired she began to gather
together and pack into a bag such few clothes as she could carry. She had
made up her mind to go, and to go silently before the house waked.
Whither she was to go, and what she was to do once she had gone, she
could not think. She asked herself the questions in vain, feeling very
lonely and very helpless as she moved softly about the room by the light
of her candle. Her friend might write to her and she would not receive
his letter. Still she must go. Once or twice she stopped her work, and
crouching down upon the bed allowed her tears to have their way. When she
had finished her preparations she blew out her candle, and leaning upon
the sill of the open window, gave her face to the cool night air.

There w