e added, dropping upon her knees, as if to ascertain the cause.
"Ah! it was only caught up--it is all right now."

She smoothed the folds into place and arose, while, the breakfast-bell
ringing at that moment, Mrs. Montague passed from the room, very nearly
if not quite satisfied that Ruth Richards was an entirely different
person from Mona Montague.

Poor over-wrought Mona, however, fled into her own chamber, and locked
the door the moment she was alone.

She sank into the nearest chair, buried her face in her hands, and fell
to sobbing nervously.

"How can I bear it?" she murmured. "It is perfectly dreadful to have to
live such a life of deception. I never would have been guilty of it if I
had not been caught just as I was; but I could not give her my real name,
for she would have known at once who I am; and I do so want to find out
just why my father deserted my mother, and what there was between him
and Uncle Walter that was so terrible. Perhaps I never shall, but I mean
to stay with her for a while and try. She is a strange woman," the young
girl went on, musingly. "Sometimes I think she is kind and good, then
again she seems like a designing and unprincipled person. Can it be
possible that she is contemplating an alliance with Mr. Palmer? She
certainly received his attentions last evening with every appearance of
pleasure, and he seemed to be equally delighted with her society. I
wonder if Ray will like it? Somehow the thought of it is not agreeable
to me, if--if--"

A vivid blush suffused Mona's cheeks as she reached this point in her
soliloquy, as if she was overcome at having allowed her thoughts to run
away with her to such an extent.

"So Ray is coming to Hazeldean for the ball on Monday evening," she
continued, after a while. "Shall I see him? Yes, I shall try to," with an
air of resolution. "If he loves me as well as I love him, why should any
foolish sensitiveness prevent my allowing him to make it manifest, if he
wishes? I do not believe I have any right to ruin both our lives by
hiding myself from him. I will prove him in this way; but I must see him
alone, so that no one will know that I am Mona Montague, instead of Ruth
Richards, the sewing-girl. What if _he_ should ignore me?" she added,
with sudden fear and growing very white; then, with renewed confidence:
"He will not; if he has been noble enough to confess his feelings to
his father, he will not hide them from me. He is noble and true, and