something more than mere
friendship that actuated the girl's visits. Although against their
expostulations, every cent that she could scrape together, over and
above the cost of the bare necessities of her living, she would expend
for fruit to bring to Jack.

"I feel such a great pity for him," she would say; "for he has never,
never been the same since Dorothy disappeared so suddenly." And they
would look at the girl with wistful eyes, realizing that in her case,
surely, pity was akin to love.

They guessed Jessie's secret long before she knew it herself, and they
felt sorry for her; for they knew her hopes were useless--that Jack
could never return the girl's love.

Jack's mother and Barbara talked the matter over carefully, and
concluded that it was best for the girl's peace of mind to break up this
infatuation, if they could, at once.

At this epoch an event happened which turned the tide of affairs into a
strange channel.

By the death of a relative Jack suddenly found himself possessed of a
fortune.

He heard the startling news with a white, calm, unmoved face, while his
mother and Barbara almost went wild with joy over it.

"It matters little to me now," he said. "Wealth has no charms for me."
And they well knew why.

The intelligence came like a thunderbolt to Jessie Staples.

It was Mrs. Garner who told about it while the family were gathered
about the tea-table.

The girl's face grew white as death, and she looked over at Jack with
startled eyes.

Before she could ask the question that sprang to her lips, Mrs. Garner
added:

"Of course this will make a great change in Jack's prospects. He says
that we shall soon leave the little cottage and go out West
somewhere--Barbara and I and himself--and that we will leave New York
City far behind us, as there is no tie that binds him here now."

Jessie tried to speak, but the words refused to come to her icy lips.
She made an effort to raise her eyes to Jack's face, with a careless
smile; but it was a failure--a dire failure.

The table seemed to suddenly rise and dance before her.

She rose hastily, with a wild prayer that she might get quickly out of
the room, for she felt her throat choking up with great sobs, and
realized that in an instant more she would have burst into tears.

Poor Jessie Staples took one step forward, then fell unconscious at
Jack's feet.

"Why, what in the world can be the matter with Jessie?" he cried,
raising her in his