e Family,' Tom?" I suggested, meekly.

"Come to think of it," admitted Tom, "it must have been 'The Happy
Family.' Get your things on, Mysie, and we'll get out of this inhuman
place."

I held my head as high as I could when I came back through the lobby,
with a stout chambermaid carrying my suit-case. The clerk sniffed
audibly; the proprietress met me with a granite eye; the lady with the
three chins muttered something which I am convinced it would not have
added to my personal happiness to hear; but I thought the girl with the
lavender poodle watched me a little wistfully as I whirled away upon my
husband's big forgiving arm.

The doctor, who had really laughed until he cried, followed, wiping his
merry eyes. These glistened when on the sidewalk directly opposite the
hotel entrance we met Elizabeth Talbert, who had arranged, but in the
agitation of the morning I had entirely forgotten it, to come to see me
at that very hour.

So we fell into line, the doctor and Aunt Elizabeth, my husband and I,
on our way to take the cars for "The Happy Family," when suddenly Tom
clapped his hands to his pockets and announced that he had forgotten--he
must send a telegram. Coming away in such a hurry, he must telegraph to
the Works. Tom is an incurable telegrapher (I have long cherished the
conviction that he is the main support of the Western Union Telegraph
Company), and we all followed him to the nearest office where he could
get a wire.

Some one was before him at the window, a person holding a hesitant
pencil above a yellow blank. I believe I am not without self-possession
myself, partly natural, and partly acquired by living so long with Tom;
but it took all I ever had not to utter a womanish cry when the young
man turned his face and I saw that it was Harry Goward.

The boy's glance swept us all in. When it reached Aunt Elizabeth and Dr.
Denbigh he paled, whether with relief or regret I had my doubts at that
moment, and I have them still. An emotion of some species possessed him
so that he could not for the moment speak. Aunt Elizabeth was the first
to recover herself.

"Ah?" she cooed. "What a happy accident! Mr. Goward, allow me to present
you to my friend Dr. Denbigh."

The doctor bowed with a portentous gravity. It was almost the equal of
Harry's own.

After this satisfactory incident everybody fell back instinctively and
gave the command of the expedition to me. The boy anxiously yielded
his place at the telegr