ount
of business for a new-comer into the neighborhood, who naturally would
be excused from assuming entire charge of things.

Mr. Reed met Don and Dorry on the piazza. Greetings and good-nights
were soon over; and before long, Dorry, in her sweet, sound sleep,
forgot alike the pleasures and adventures of the day.

Meantime, Mr. Reed and Donald were busily engaged in examining old
family ambrotypes, papers, and various articles that, carefully hidden
in the uncle's secretary, had been saved all these years in the hope
that they might furnish a clew to Dorry's parentage, or perhaps prove
that she was, as Mr. Reed trusted, the daughter of his brother Wolcott.
To Donald each article was full of interest and hopeful possibilities;
but his uncle looked at them wearily and sadly, because the very sight
of them recalled a throng of disappointments and baffled surmises. There
were the little caps and baby-garments, yellow, rumpled, and
weather-stained, just as they had been taken off and carefully labelled
on that day nearly fifteen years ago. Donald noticed that one parcel of
these articles was marked, "Belonging to the boy, Donald," and the other
simply "Belonging to the girl." There were the photographs of the two
babies, which had been taken a week after their landing, carefully
labelled in the same way, giving the boy's name but leaving a blank in
place of the girl's. Poor, pinched, expressionless-looking little
creatures, both of them were; for, as Uncle George explained to the
crestfallen Donald, the babies were really ill at first, from exposure
and unsuitable feeding. Then there were the two tiny papers containing
each a lock of hair, and these also were marked, one, "The boy, Donald,"
and the other simply "The girl." Donald's had only a few pale little
brown hairs, but "the girl's" paper disclosed a soft, yellow little
curl.

"She had more than you had," remarked Uncle George, as he carefully
closed the paper again; "you'll see that, also, by the accurate
description of the two children that I wrote at the time. Here it is."

Donald glanced over the paper, as if intending to read it later, and
then took up the chain with a square clasp, the same that Uncle George
held in his hand when we saw him in the study on the day of the
shooting-match. Three delicate strands of gold chain came together at
the clasp, which was still closed. This clasp was prettily embossed on
its upper surface, while its under side was smooth