t finally yielded to Carol's
entreaties and Ruth's own desire.

"I shall graduate next year, Uncle, and then I can come back to you
for good."

That evening when Ruth was alone in her room, trying to collect her
thoughts and realize that the home and love that she had so craved
were really to be hers at last, Golden Carol was with her mother in
the room below, talking it all over.

"Just think, Mother, if I had not asked Ruth to come here, this would
not have happened. And I didn't want to, I wanted to ask Maud so much,
and I was dreadfully disappointed when I couldn't--for I really
couldn't. I could not help remembering the look in Ruth's eyes when
she said that she had no home to go to, and so I asked her instead of
Maud. How dreadful it would have been if I hadn't."

Detected by the Camera

One summer I was attacked by the craze for amateur photography. It
became chronic afterwards, and I and my camera have never since been
parted. We have had some odd adventures together, and one of the most
novel of our experiences was that in which we played the part of chief
witness against Ned Brooke.

I may say that my name is Amy Clarke, and that I believe I am
considered the best amateur photographer in our part of the country.
That is all I need tell you about myself.

Mr. Carroll had asked me to photograph his place for him when the
apple orchards were in bloom. He has a picturesque old-fashioned
country house behind a lawn of the most delightful old trees and
flanked on each side by the orchards. So I went one June afternoon,
with all my accoutrements, prepared to "take" the Carroll
establishment in my best style.

Mr. Carroll was away but was expected home soon, so we waited for him,
as all the family wished to be photographed under the big maple at the
front door. I prowled around among the shrubbery at the lower end of
the lawn and, after a great deal of squinting from various angles, I
at last fixed upon the spot from which I thought the best view of the
house might be obtained. Then Gertie and Lilian Carroll and I got into
the hammocks and swung at our leisure, enjoying the cool breeze
sweeping through the maples.

Ned Brooke was hanging around as usual, watching us furtively. Ned was
one of the hopeful members of a family that lived in a tumble-down
shanty just across the road from the Carrolls. They were wretchedly
poor, and old Brooke, as he was called, and Ned were employed a good
deal by Mr.