quaint effect on the nerves.

"Miss MacDonald is _not_ my daughter," said Mrs. West, laughing wildly.
"I'm not _quite_ old enough yet to have a daughter of her age, and she's
not such a child as she looks. But _do_ talk to her, by all means. I'm
sure she'll be very pleased."

"Then your name _is_ MacDonald?" Jack Morrison exclaimed. "We were
saying at dinner how much you look like Mrs. Bal MacDonald, the
beautiful actress. Is she any relation?"

"Yes, she is," I answered. And I would have gone on to tell him and his
friends that she was my mother, but I saw Sir S. and Mrs. West and Basil
looking as if they wanted to get away, so I dared not go into
particulars.

"Do tell us about it," said all the American boys together, when I
paused to take breath and think. I should have loved to stop and talk
about mother, but magnetic thrills of disapproval from my guardians
crackled through me. "If you're in Edinburgh next week maybe you'll find
out," I said consolingly. "But now I must go."

I bowed nicely, and they bowed still more nicely, trying to look
wistful, as if they didn't want me to hurry away.

We went to a private sitting-room Sir S. had taken, so I suppose he had
invited Basil and Mrs. West; and I thought they would speak of the
American boys, but nobody even referred to their existence. This made me
feel somehow as if I were being snubbed. I don't know why, for nobody
was unkind.

Afterward, when Mrs. James and I went to our adjoining bedrooms, I asked
her if I had done anything I ought not to have done.

"No, my dear child," said she, smoothing my hair, which I'd begun to
unplait. "Nothing except----" and she hesitated.

"Except what? Tell me the worst."

"There isn't any worst. You did nothing that Mrs. West and I wouldn't
like to do, if we could. I won't go into particulars, if you don't mind,
because it wouldn't be good for you if I did, and might make you
self-conscious--a great misfortune that would spoil what some of us like
best in you. But you needn't worry."

"Mrs. West looked as if she longed to scratch my eyes out. She needn't
have been so _very_ vexed at my being taken for her daughter. I'm not a
scarecrow, or a village idiot."

Mrs. James laughed, a well-trained little laugh she has, which seems
taught to go on so far and no farther--like the tune I once heard a
bullfinch sing in a shop.

"My dear, you're too young and unworldly to understand these things,"
she said. "A pretty woman, a