are good for; but you will have
your work, as I have pointed out. If you are industrious, I shall lend
you a horse that was your aunt's--he is not up to my weight--and I will
take you to our fine club when I can spare an afternoon. At present, I
am immensely occupied, engaged in collecting wolfram. Do you know what
wolfram is?"

"No, I have never heard of it," humbly admitted Sophy.

"Well, it is ore used for hardening steel--extremely scarce and
valuable; it comes from Tavoy, but business connected with it takes me
up and down the river, and even as far as Calcutta and Singapore. Now,
with you to look after the house and your aunt, I shall feel so free
and easy in my mind. Ah, here we are; this is 'Heidelberg,'" he said,
as the car swung in between two tall gate piers.

"Heidelberg" was a good-sized residence, with spacious surroundings;
palms, bamboos and crotona abounded, and a wonderful collection of
gigantic cannas--red, yellow and orange--gave colour to the compound.
A crowd of lazy retainers, who were hanging about, gaped in silence
upon the new arrival.

"Now, I'll take you to your aunt at once," said Krauss, descending
heavily from the car, but making no effort to assist his niece. Then
he led the way upstairs, striding along the veranda with a heavy,
despotic tread, and through a large, dim drawing-room, where Sophy
caught an impression of much carved furniture, the figure of a large
alabaster Buddha gleaming through the shadows, and a stifling
atmosphere of dust and sandalwood. Pushing aside a tinkling bamboo
screen, they entered another apartment, which was yet gloomier and more
obscure, and here on a wide sofa, propped, among large, silk cushions,
lay a sick and wasted woman, who turned on Sophy a sallow face and a
pair of drowsy, dark eyes.

"Here is your new treasure, mein schatz," announced her husband! "I
brought her straight up."

"Oh, dear child," she murmured, "this is one of my--my dreadful days;
so sorry--so sorry--so sorry," and she slowly closed her eyes upon her
pretty niece.

Sophy stooped and lifted her hand (which was limp and clammy) to her
lips, and said to herself, as she did so, that poor Aunt Flora was
woefully changed. She recalled her as a beautiful vision, beautifully
dressed, and so gay. Now her face was yellow and withered, and she
looked positively old and gaunt.

All at once a buxom ayah advanced---a stout, straight-backed Madrassi,
with her black hair in a ch