might
come a time when he would be ashamed of me. I don't say that I shall
never marry him; for I have hoped--I have a presentiment that in some
strange way I shall find out who I am, and who my parents were. It may
be mere imagination on my part, but somehow I believe it is more than
that."

"Are you sure there was no mark on the things that were found upon you?"
said the elder woman.

"Ah yes," sighed Clara, "I am sure, for I have looked at them a hundred
times. They tell me nothing, and yet they suggest to me many things.
Come," she said, taking the other by the hand, "and I will show them to
you."

She led the way along the hall to her sitting-room, and to her
bedchamber beyond. It was a small room hung with paper showing a pattern
of morning-glories on a light ground, with dotted muslin curtains, a
white iron bedstead, a few prints on the wall, a rocking-chair--a very
dainty room. She went to the maple dressing-case, and opened one of the
drawers.

As they stood for a moment, the mirror reflecting and framing their
image, more than one point of resemblance between them was emphasized.
There was something of the same oval face, and in Clara's hair a faint
suggestion of the wave in the older woman's; and though Clara was fairer
of complexion, and her eyes were gray and the other's black, there was
visible, under the influence of the momentary excitement, one of those
indefinable likenesses which are at times encountered,--sometimes
marking blood relationship, sometimes the impress of a common training;
in one case perhaps a mere earmark of temperament, and in another the
index of a type. Except for the difference in color, one might imagine
that if the younger woman were twenty years older the resemblance would
be still more apparent.

Clara reached her hand into the drawer and drew out a folded packet,
which she unwrapped, Mrs. Harper following her movements meanwhile with
a suppressed intensity of interest which Clara, had she not been
absorbed in her own thoughts, could not have failed to observe.

When the last fold of paper was removed there lay revealed a child's
muslin slip. Clara lifted it and shook it gently until it was unfolded
before their eyes. The lower half was delicately worked in a lacelike
pattern, revealing an immense amount of patient labor.

The elder woman seized the slip with hands which could not disguise
their trembling. Scanning the garment carefully, she seemed to be noting
the p