ankle very much,—and she says she's going out herself after this. I don't expect to get out again."

There was a moment of horrified silence after[Pg 68] this blow. Then Janet, no longer able to endure the bewilderment, burst out:

[Pg 68]

"Cecily dear, please forgive us if we seem to be prying into your affairs. It's only because we think so much of you. But who is Miss Benedict, and what is she to you?"

"I don't know!" said Cecily slowly.

"You don't know!" they gasped in chorus.

"No, I really don't. It must seem very strange to you, and it does to me. Miss Benedict is a perfect stranger to me, and no relation, so far as I know. I never saw or heard of her before I came here."

"But why are you here then?" demanded Marcia.

"I—don't know. It's all a mystery to me. But I'm so lonely I've cried myself to sleep many a night."

"Won't you tell us all about it?" begged Marcia. "We're your friends, Cecily,—you say the only ones you have,—and we don't ask just out of curiosity, but because we're interested in you, and—and love you."

"Well, I will then," agreed the girl, as they[Pg 69] walked along. "I'll just tell you how it all happened. Ever since I can remember anything, I've lived in Cranby, a little village in England. Mother and I lived there together. We never went anywhere, not even up to London, because she was never very strong. Father was dead; he died when I was a tiny baby, she told me. We just had a happy, quiet life together, we two.

[Pg 69]

"Well, about the beginning of this year, Mother was suddenly taken very, very ill. I don't know what was the matter, but I hardly had time to call in a neighbor and then bring the doctor." Cecily paused and choked down a rising sob.

"She—she just slipped away before we knew it," she went on, very low. Marcia pressed her hand in wordless sympathy. Presently Cecily continued:

"Afterward, the neighbor, Mrs. Waddington, told me that while I was fetching the doctor Mother had begged her to see that, if she didn't recover, I should be taken over to New York, and left with a family named Benedict,[Pg 70] and she had Mrs. Waddington write 

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