hat which met her startled eyes when she had first looked into the
safe was beyond anything conceived by her rather limited imagination.

She opened the door between the rooms quietly, and went in, leaving a
crack that she might hear any movement on the part of her patient. She
crossed the sitting room in the dark. Reaching the bedroom she pulled
the chain of the lamp, then set a screen to hide any ray of light which
might escape.

The room was furnished with a feeling for delicate color--gold and
ivory--Japanese prints--pale silks and crepes--a bit of jade--a cabinet
inlaid with mother-of-pearl. But Hilda's eyes were not for these.
Indeed, she knew nothing of their value, nothing, indeed, of the value
of the Chinese scroll which so effectually hid the panel in the wall.

Within the safe was a large velvet box, and several smaller ones. It
was from the big box that Hilda had taken the miniature, and it
contained also the crown which she yearned to wear.

She called it a crown! It was a tiara of diamonds, peaked up to a
point in front. There was, also, the wide collar of pearls with the
diamond slides which had been worn by the painted lady on the stairs.
In the smaller boxes were more pearls, long strings of them; sapphires
like a midnight sky, opals, fire in a mist; rubies, emeralds--. They
should have been locked in a vault at the General's bank, but he had
wanted nothing taken away, nothing disturbed. Yet with that touch of
fever upon him he had given the key to Hilda.

She took off her cap and turned in the neck of her white linen gown.
The pearl collar was a bit small for her, but she managed to snap the
three slides. She set the sparkling circlet on her head.

Then she stood back and surveyed herself in the oval mirror!

Gone was the Hilda Merritt whom she had known, and in her place was a
queen with a crown! She smiled at her reflection and nodded. For once
she was swayed from her stillness and stolidity. She loaded her long
hands with rings, and held them to her cheeks; then, struck by the
contrast of her white linen sleeve, she rummaged in one of the big
closets, and threw on the bed a drift of exquisite apparel.

The gowns were all too small for her, but there was a cloak of velvet
and ermine. The General's wife had worn it to the White House dinner
over the gown in which she had been painted. Hilda drew the cloak
about her shoulders, and laughed noiselessly. She could look like
this, an