l to her, at all events. I daresay he fell in love
with some other girl about that time, and slighted my mother for her."

"Well," says Mr. Desmond, drawing a deep breath, "he _is_ 'a grand
man!'"

"I think he must be a very _horrid_ old man," replies Monica, severely.

"You have proofs of his iniquity, of course," says Brian, presently, who
evidently finds a difficulty in believing in his uncle's guilt.

"Yes. He wrote her a letter, stating in distinct terms that"--and here
she alters her voice until it is highly suggestive of Miss Blake's fine
contralto--"'he deemed it expedient for both parties that the present
engagement existing between them should be annulled.' Those are Aunt
Priscilla's words; what he really meant, I suppose, was that he was
tired of her."

"Your mother, I should imagine, was hardly a woman to be tired of
readily."

"That is a matter of opinion. We--that is, Terry and Kit and I--thought
her a very tiresome woman indeed," says Miss Beresford, calmly. She does
not look at him as she makes this startling speech, but looks beyond
him into, possibly, a past where the "tiresome woman" held a part.

Brian Desmond, gazing at her pale, pure, spiritual face, sustains a
faint shock, as the meaning of her words reaches him. Is she heartless,
emotionless? Could not even a mother's love touch her and wake her into
life and feeling?

"You weren't very fond of your mother, then?" he asks, gently. The bare
memory of his own mother is adored by him.

"Fond?" says Monica, as though the idea is a new one to her. "Fond? Yes,
I suppose so; but we were all much fonder of my father. Not that either
he or mamma took very much notice of us."

"Were they so much wrapt up in each other, then?"

"No, certainly not," quickly. Then with an amount of bitterness in her
tone that contrasts strangely with its usual softness, "I wonder why I
called my mother 'mamma' to you just now. I never dared do so to _her_.
Once when she was going away somewhere I threw my arms around her and
called her by that pet name; but she put me from her, and told me I was
not to make a noise like a sheep."

She seems more annoyed than distressed as she says this. Desmond is
silent. Perhaps his silence frightens her, because she turns to him with
a rather pale, nervous face.

"I suppose I should not say such things as these to you," she says,
unsteadily. "I forgot, it did not occur to me, that we are only
strangers."

"Say what you wil