ssons in
good taste? Positively, every blind is closed, and there isn't a
liveried being to be seen."

Mrs. Keith laughed softly. "I don't know what has happened to the
_parvenus_, my dear, but whether good or bad it has taken them away,
liveries and all. The house has a new tenant, who is not so amusing,
perhaps, but is certainly more mysterious. So, after all, the exchange
may not have been a gain to the neighborhood."

Claire peeped out again. "A mysterious tenant, you say, mamma? That
must be an improvement. What is the Mystery like?"

Mrs. Keith smiled indulgently on her daughter.

"There is not much to tell, my love. I don't know whether the lady
who has taken the house is young or old, handsome or ugly, married or
single. She lives the life of a recluse; has never been seen, at least
by any of us, to walk out. But she drives sometimes in a close
carriage, and always with a thick veil hiding her face. She is tall,
dresses richly, but always in black, although the fabric is not that
usually worn as mourning. She moves from the door to her carriage with
a languid gait, as if she might be an invalid. No one goes there, and
I understand she is not at home to callers, although, of course, I
have not made the experiment myself. There, my dear, I think that is
about all."

"She seems to be a woman of wealth?"

"Evidently; her horses are very fine animals, and her carriage a
costly one. Her servants wear a neat, plain livery, and apparently her
house is elegantly furnished."

"And mamma," said Robbie, who had been standing quietly at her side,
"you forget the flowers."

"True, Robbie. Every day, Claire, the florist leaves a basket of white
flowers at her door."

"I like that," asserted Claire. "She must have refinement."

"She certainly has that air."

"Well," said Claire, laughing lightly, "I shall make a study of the
woman across the way."

With that the subject dropped for the time. But as the days went on,
and she settled herself once more into the home routine, Claire found
that not the least among the things she chose to consider interesting
was the mysterious neighbor across the way.

And now, having put considerable distance between herself and Edward
Percy, she wrote him a few cool lines of dismissal.

And here again the individuality of the girl was very manifest. Many a
woman would have written a scathing letter, telling the man how
thoroughly unmasked he stood in her sight, letting him know