ent I am at home again," I said; "and I will
take care that it is carefully preserved for the future."

"I want more than that," she rejoined. "If you can't wear the flag about
you, I want it always to be _with_ you--to go wherever you go. When
they brought your luggage here from the vessel at Lerwick, you
were particularly anxious about the safety of your traveling
writing-desk--the desk there on the table. Is there anything very
valuable in it?"

"It contains my money, and other things that I prize far more highly--my
mother's letters, and some family relics which I should be very sorry
to lose. Besides, the desk itself has its own familiar interest as my
constant traveling companion of many years past."

Miss Dunross rose, and came close to the chair in which I was sitting.

"Let Mary's flag be your constant traveling companion," she said. "You
have spoken far too gratefully of my services here as your nurse.
Reward me beyond my deserts. Make allowances, Mr. Germaine, for the
superstitious fancies of a lonely, dreamy woman. Promise me that the
green flag shall take its place among the other little treasures in your
desk!"

It is needless to say that I made the allowances and gave the
promise--gave it, resolving seriously to abide by it. For the first
time since I had known her, she put her poor, wasted hand in mine,
and pressed it for a moment. Acting heedlessly under my first grateful
impulse, I lifted her hand to my lips before I released it. She
started--trembled--and suddenly and silently passed out of the room.

CHAPTER XXI. SHE COMES BETWEEN US.

WHAT emotion had I thoughtlessly aroused in Miss Dunross? Had I offended
or distressed her? Or had I, without meaning it, forced on her inner
knowledge some deeply seated feeling which she had thus far resolutely
ignored?

I looked back through the days of my sojourn in the house; I questioned
my own feelings and impressions, on the chance that they might serve me
as a means of solving the mystery of her sudden flight from the room.

What effect had she produced on me?

In plain truth, she had simply taken her place in my mind, to the
exclusion of every other person and every other subject. In ten days she
had taken a hold on my sympathies of which other women would have failed
to possess themselves in so many years. I remembered, to my shame, that
my mother had but seldom occupied my thoughts. Even the image of Mrs.
Van Brandt--except when the conversation