ence laughed, yet there was a catch in her voice too. She kissed
the girl's tear-wet face tenderly. Sheila's heart throbbed so that
she could scarcely go on with the task of shaving Cap'n Ira. How
could she continue to live this lie before two people who were so
infinitely kind to her and who loved her so tenderly?

And the girl loved them in return. It was no selfish thought which
held Sheila Macklin here in the old house on Wreckers' Head. She had
put aside all concern for her own personal comfort or ease. Had it
not been for her desire to shield Tunis and continue to aid and
comfort Cap'n Ira and Prudence, she might quickly and quietly have
left the place and thus have escaped all possibility of punishment
for the deception she had practiced.

Yes, had these other considerations not been involved, she would
have run away! Although she chanced to have no money just at this
time, she would have left the Ball homestead and Wreckers' Head and
the town itself and walked so far away that nobody who knew her
would ever see her again. She had thought of doing this even as far
back as the time when she was so lonely and miserable in Boston.
Now, she would willingly have become a tramp for the purpose of
getting out of the affliction which enmeshed her.

She could not, nevertheless, yield to this temptation. If she ran
away from the Balls and Big Wreck Cove, she would tacitly admit the
truth of all Ida May Bostwick's claims, and possibly involve Tunis
in the wreckage. Therefore she held to her determination of keeping
her place here until she was actually driven forth.

As a last resort, having now worked out the detail of that plan in
her mind, she believed she could save Tunis from much calumny if it
became positively necessary for her to depart under this cloud and
abandon her place to the real Ida May. The latter must, however,
come with positive proof of her identity--evidence sufficient to
convince Cap'n Ira and Prudence--before Sheila Macklin would release
her grasp upon what she had obtained by trickery and deceit.

Not for a moment did the girl try to excuse to herself what she had
done. In spite of the Balls' need of her, and in spite of Tunis'
love, Sheila did not try to deceive herself with any sophistry about
the end justifying the deed. Such thinking could not satisfy her
now.

Sheila's eyes were opened. She beheld before her both the wide and
the narrow way. If she took the pleasanter path, it was with a