seem to gain much information, except that everybody but
herself--and perhaps the old gentleman Fishblate--was having a good
time. Nor could she get hold of anything "dreadful," which was the
greatest disappointment of all.

One night, however, listening at her own door as Nattie bade Cyn "good
night," over the way, Miss Kling heard Clem call out from within,
something that made her very hair stand on end. It was this:

"Please wake me up earlier than usual to-morrow morning, will you,
Nattie?"

"Wake him up, indeed!" thought the outraged but happy Miss Kling, as she
wended her way back to her own room. "Pretty goings on! and I know I
heard that machine clatter when she was not in, one day! Machines do not
clatter without a human agency somewhere! There is something wrong here!
and I will find it out, or my name is not Betsey Kling 'Wake him up,'
indeed!"

CHAPTER XII.

CROSSES ON THE LINE.

It happened that not long after Cyn sang at a concert given in one of
the principal halls of the city. Of course, a party from the Hotel
Norman attended. This party consisted not only of all the young people,
but also included Mrs. Simonson.

Cyn made a great success, and was encored every time she sang. Never had
Nattie so fully realized the beauty and brilliancy of her friend, as she
did upon that evening. Nor could she fail to observe that Clem, too, was
startled into a new admiration. Was it because of this that a
seriousness, quite foreign to the gay scene, fell over Nattie's face?

As for Celeste, she was decidedly envious, and had there been no
gentlemen in the party, would have turned exceedingly glum. As it was,
she, with some difficulty, called up her usual smiles, and contented
herself with whispering spitefully to Quimby,

"How can she appear before the public so? it seems _so_ unwomanly!"

"Charming, indeed!" replied Quimby, without the slightest idea of what
she had said, as his attention was concentrated on Cyn, and his brain
incapable of entertaining two ideas at once.

But while acknowledging her attractions, Quimby preserved his composure,
arguing to himself in a common sense way,

"What is the use of a fellow falling in love with a girl that every
other fellow is sure to fall in love with too, you know?"

Mrs. Simonson, good soul, quite swelled with pride in her lodger, and by
her behavior created the impression in the minds of people sitting near,
that she was the singer's mother.

And