e advised me to trust
her, but this one's different. Yes, quite different." She stopped and
burst into tears: "Harry, my boy, you're all I have. I don't want to
lose you--I don't----"

Harry looked distressed.

"Now--now--don't cry," he said. "You won't lose me. You'll get a
daughter--that's all."

"God knows I've always wanted a daughter!"

"Well, let me pick one out for you. I think my judgment is better than
yours."

The little door opposite which Harry had been watching so eagerly
suddenly opened, and a young woman quietly entered the sitting room. It
was Paula Marsh, dressed in her street clothes.

She nodded to mother and son in a friendly but reserved manner, and was
about to pass out through another door into the outer hall without
speaking when she seemed to remember something. Opening a small bag, she
said amiably:

"Oh, Mrs. Parkes, I was looking for you. I've just come in. Here is what
I owe you. I am sorry----"

Mrs. Parkes, all flustered, rose from the chair.

"Oh, please--not now--there's no hurry--not just now. You look so
tired--sit down a moment and rest yourself."

Paula smiled at her landlady's solicitude, and, taking off her hat and
coat, thrust some money in the elder woman's hand.

"Yes--yes--I insist," she said. "I've been downtown all morning, waiting
for my lawyer in a stuffy little office--and even then I didn't succeed
in seeing Mr. Ricaby. Nothing makes one so tired as failing to do what
one starts out to do."

"Sit down, dear, and rest yourself," said Mrs. Parkes, proceeding to
bustle about. "Let me get you a cup of tea--now, do--you look so tired!"

"Don't say that, please," protested the young girl. "It makes me feel
ten times more tired than I really am."

"But I insist. The water is boiling," said the landlady, hurrying out of
the room. "I won't be a moment. A nice cup of tea is just the thing.
Harry will keep you company while I'm gone." With a mischievous wink at
her son, she added, as she disappeared: "Won't you, Harry--like a good
boy?"

CHAPTER VII.

Two years had slipped by since Paula's return to America and matters
relating to the inheritance were no nearer actual settlement than
before. They were even more complicated, for the law, with all its
ponderous, intricate machinery, all its chicanery and false swearing,
had been set in motion, not to protect the orphan but to shield those
knaves who sought to enjoy what was not their own.

Tod's startli