e!"

"And she's no more his sister than I am, either!" chimed in Mrs.
Wedmore, who had risen from her chair in great excitement.

Mr. Wedmore stared at his wife.

"Sister!" cried he, in a voice of thunder. "Whose sister? Dudley Horne
never had a sister!"

"I know that, but that's the story they have made up for us; and the
girls--our girls--are ready to believe it, and I don't want them to know
it isn't true."

"Well, whatever she is, and whoever she is, I want her to be outside the
house before lunch time," said Mr. Wedmore. "I've just caught Max with
his arm around her, and I haven't the slightest doubt that it was he who
made up the story. Any tale's good enough for the old people! Look at
her face--look at her dress! She is some hussy who ought never to have
been allowed inside the house!"

"It was Doreen who brought her in. And, to do her justice, George, I
believe the girl didn't want to come," said Mrs. Wedmore. "And it's
about Doreen I wanted to talk to you, George. This coming of Dudley has
upset all the good we did by never mentioning him to her. To-day she's
as much excited, as anxious and as miserable as if they were still
engaged. And--and--oh! if the police come here to the house and take him
awa-a-ay,"--and here the poor lady became almost too hysterical to
articulate--"it will break the child's heart, George; it will indeed.
And, oh! do you think it possible he really did--really did--"

"Did what?"

"Oh, you know! It's to dreadful to say. Why do you make me say it? They
say something about his having gone out of his mind, and--and--killed
somebody. It isn't true, George, is it?"

"I don't know, I'm sure. Who told you?"

"Max first, and then I learned the rest from the guesses of the girls.
Oh, it is dreadful--shocking! And to think of his having been planted
down upon us like this, just when I was beginning to hope that Doreen
was getting kinder to Mr. Lindsay."

"It's all the doing of that idiot Max!" said Mr. Wedmore, angrily. "I'll
send him out to the Cape, and make an end of it. He shall go next
month."

"Oh, I didn't want that," pleaded Mrs. Wedmore, with a sudden change to
tenderness and self-reproach. "Don't do anything in a hurry, George,
anything you will be sorry for afterward."

"Sorry for! The only thing I'm sorry for is that I didn't send him
before, and saved all this."

"And as for the girl, no doubt it's her fault, and Dudley's, a great
deal more than Max's," went on t