been lying curled up on the lounge, the personification of
graceful animal ease. At Anna's words she seemed suddenly to stiffen.
Her softly intertwined fingers became rigid. The little spot of rouge
was vivid enough now by reason of this new pallor, which seemed to
draw the colour even from her lips. But she did not speak. She made no
attempt to answer her sister's question. Anna looked at her curiously,
and with sinking heart.

"You must answer me, Annabel," she continued. "You must tell me the
truth, please. It is necessary."

Annabel rose slowly to her feet, walked to the door as though to see
that it was shut, and came back with slow lagging footsteps.

"There was a man called Montague Hill," she said hoarsely, "but he is
dead."

"Then there is also," Anna remarked, "a Montague Hill who is very much
alive. Not only that, but he is here in London. I have just come from
him."

Annabel no longer attempted to conceal her emotion. She battled with a
deadly faintness, and she tottered rather than walked back to her
seat. Anna, quitting her chair, dropped on her knees by her sister's
side and took her hand.

"Do not be frightened, dear," she said. "You must tell me the truth,
and I will see that no harm comes to you."

"The only Montague Hill I ever knew," Annabel said slowly, "is dead. I
know he is dead. I saw him lying on the footway. I felt his heart. It
had ceased to beat. It was a motor accident--a fatal motor accident
the evening papers called it. They could not have called it a fatal
motor accident if he had not been dead."

Anna nodded.

"Yes, I remember," she said. "It was the night you left Paris. They
thought that he was dead at first, and they took him to the hospital.
I believe that his recovery was considered almost miraculous."

"Alive," Annabel moaned, her eyes large with terror. "You say that he
is alive."

"He is certainly alive," Anna declared. "More than that, he arrived
to-day at the boarding-house where I am staying, greeted me with a
theatrical start, and claimed me--as his wife. That is why I am here.
You must tell me what it all means."

"And you?" Annabel exclaimed. "What did you say?"

"Well, I considered myself justified in denying it," Anna answered
drily. "He produced what he called a marriage certificate, and I
believe that nearly every one in the boarding-house, including Mrs.
White, my landlady, believes his story. I am fairly well hardened in
iniquity--your iniquity, Anna