For the two ensuing days, Marcia and Janet, tense with excitement, discussed the most recently discovered inmate of "Benedict's Folly," and watched incessantly for another glimpse of the face behind the shutter. How was it, they constantly demanded of each other, that a girl of fourteen or fifteen had come to be shut up in the dreary old place? Was she a prisoner there? Was she a relative, friend, or servant? Was she free to come and go? To the latter question they unanimously voted "No!" How could she be aught else but a prisoner when she was never seen going in or out, was forced to take her exercise after nightfall in the dark garden, and was kept constantly[Pg 33] behind closed shutters? No girl of that age in her right mind could deliberately choose a life like that! [Pg 33] "Do you suppose she has always lived there?" queried Marcia, for the twentieth time. And as Janet could answer it no better than herself, she propounded another question: "And why do you suppose she opened the shutter and looked out, seeming so delighted, when I played, and then drew in again so quickly when we noticed her? Is she afraid of being seen, too?" "Evidently," said Janet. "She must be as full of mystery as the rest of them. And yet—I can't, somehow, feel that she is like them; she's so sweet and young and—oh, you know what I mean!" Of course she knew, but it didn't help them in the least to solve this latest phase of their mystery. Finally Marcia, who still clung a bit shyly to the fairy lore of her earlier years, declared: "I believe she's a regular Cinderella, kept[Pg 34] there to do all the hard work of the place by those queer old ladies, and I shouldn't be a bit surprised if she's down in the kitchen this minute, cleaning out the ashes of the stove! Come, Jan, let's go for a walk, and when we come back I'll play on the violin by the window. Maybe our little Cinderella will peep out again!" [Pg 34] The two girls put on their hats and strolled out for their usual afternoon walk and treat of ice-cream soda. But they had gone no farther from their own door than the length of the Benedict brick wall when they were suddenly brought to a halt in front of the closed gate by hearing a sound on the other side of it. It was a sound indicative of some one's struggling attempt to open it—the click of a key turning and turning in the lock and
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