he was hurt.

'I am sorry for you, my boy,' Frank said at last, 'but glad for
Jerrie--so glad--and she will not be hard on us.'

'I shall ask no favors of her. I can stand it if you can, though money
is a good thing to have.'

And then, without in the least knowing why, he thought of Ann Eliza, and
wondered how her ankle was getting along, and if he ought not to have
called upon her again.

'Marian is going to read the papers in Maude's room, and I have come for
you,' Frank said.

'I don't care to hear them,' Tom replied. 'I am satisfied that we are
beggars, and Jerrie the heiress.'

But Frank insisted, and Tom went with him to his sister's room, followed
by their friends, for whom the dinner was waiting and spoiling in the
kitchen, where as yet no hint of what was transpiring had reached, save
the fact that Maude had been down stairs and fainted. She was propped
upon pillows scarcely whiter than her face save where two crimson spots
burned brightly, and her eyes were fixed constantly upon Jerrie, who sat
beside her, holding her cold, clammy hands, which she occasionally
patted, and kissed and caressed.

'Where did you find the bag?' the judge asked; and then Jerrie narrated
the particulars of her interview with Peterkin, whose destruction of the
table had resulted in her finding the bag with the diamonds in it.
'They were mother's,' she said, the last words almost a sob, as she
turned her eyes upon Mrs. Tracy, who stood like a block of stone, with
no sympathy or credulity upon her face. 'Father bought them for her at
the same time with Mrs. Tracy's, which they are exactly like. It is so
written in her letter. And she sent them for me. They are mine and I
gave them to Harold to keep untill I could think what to do. The
diamonds are mine.'

She was still looking at Mrs. Tracy, on whom all eyes were now resting
as the precious stones flashed, and glittered, and shone in the sunlight
in the hall in all the colors of the rainbow.

For an instant the proud woman hesitated, then, quickly unclasping the
ear-rings and the pin, she laid them in Jerrie's lap.

'You are welcome to your property, if it is yours, I am sure,' she said,
and was about to leave the room.

But her husband kept her back.

'No, Dolly,' he said. 'You must stay, and hear, and know. It concerns us
all.'

As he had closed the door and stood against it she had no alternative
except to stay, but she walked to the window and stood with her back t