She thought:

"Fidelio--that means faithful--so it must be some dear friend of
Dainty's that wants to find her so badly--perhaps her husband; for I am
bound to believe she was secretly married. So I will write to Fidelio,
and tell him all I know of the dear girl's fate."

On the same day, almost the same hour, a pretty, sad-faced woman at the
insane asylum in Staunton sat reading the same personals in some
newspapers the matron had given her that morning.

It was Mrs. Chase, and a great change had come over the sweet little
woman. In fact, the doctors and attendants declared that she was quite
well of her suicidal mania, and that at the next meeting of the board of
directors, on the twentieth of April, her discharge would be asked for
as a cured woman. Every one would be sorry to see her go, she was so
gentle and refined and helpful now, and the violence of her first sorrow
had subsided into patient, uncomplaining resignation.

But the strangest thing about her was that she did not seem to have a
friend in the world. No one ever came to see her or wrote to inquire how
she was. They wondered where she would go when she was discharged.

One of the new supervisors, a pale, middle-aged woman in widow's weeds,
passed through the ward when Mrs. Chase was reading the papers, and
found her weeping violently. She stopped, and asked kindly what was the
matter.

"Read these personals and I will tell you," was the sobbing reply.

The supervisor, Mrs. Middleton by name, obeyed, and cried out in
surprise:

"How very, very strange!"

"Is it not?" cried Mrs. Chase, pathetically. "You see, that girl, Dainty
Chase, is my own child. I went crazy about her, they say; but between
you and me, Mrs. Middleton, I don't believe I ever was really insane,
you know, only just wild and hysterical over my lost child, fearing her
cruel enemies had killed her, and if only they had not shut me up in
this place, I believe I should have found her long ago. If you had time
to listen, I would like to tell you my whole sad story."

"I will take time, for I am more deeply interested than you can possibly
guess," said the kind supervisor.

"Did you ever hear anything so sad? And is it any wonder that I
temporarily lost my mind and tried to throw away my life?" cried Mrs.
Chase; adding: "Is it not strange that the search for Dainty is being
revived now? It would almost seem as if Lovelace Ellsworth has recovered
the use of his senses."

"Perhaps