remarkable solo and was almost vexed
with Miss Adams and with Carl von Reuter for their evident admiration of
a stranger. It was a comfort to her to observe that Richard Ashton
seemed to be feeling just as she did and that he spent the greater part
of his time studying the audience, trying to discover just how many
important musical critics were present.

Anthony Graham also had the air of waiting for something or some one.

A quartette followed, and then a violin solo, and afterwards Betty and
Mrs. Ashton stole quietly in, taking the two chairs left vacant for
them. Polly and Miss Adams were in the front row with Dick Ashton at one
side of them, near the back of the box and yet facing the stage. In the
second row Betty had the outside seat and she kept her elbow resting on
the plush railing with her chin in her hand, entirely unconscious of the
large crowd about her. Next her Carl von Reuter had arranged his chair,
leaving Mrs. Ashton and Anthony in the rear.

A young man sang before the time for Esther's appearance, but Betty
never recalled having seen or heard him. She had left her sister
composed and not especially nervous; but there was no way of guessing
what a surge of feeling might since have overtaken her.

And then Esther's moment came.

Notwithstanding that Betty had dressed her, fixed her hair and kissed
her only a few moments before, she hardly recognized her own sister as
she walked slowly to the front of the stage. For had they not always
thought of Esther as the homeliest of their group of Camp Fire girls?
What had happened to her, what wonderful transformation had taken place?
Polly O'Neill almost gasped aloud. Of course every one of her friends
had appreciated how much Esther had improved in appearance in the past
two years, but it was hardly credible that she could look and behave
like this, a girl brought up in an orphan asylum with no friends and no
opportunities for so long a time! Well, one should understand that into
each life certain wonderful hours may come when one seems to transcend
one's self. And tonight such an hour had come to Esther.

She was to sing Elizabeth's farewell song from the opera of Tannhaeuser.
And though the concert was not to be sung in costume, so far as possible
in selecting and arranging Esther's dress Betty had been mindful of the
character and the circumstances of her song.

In the opera there is seen a wayside shrine where the Princess Elizabeth
appears each d