ior.

Mr. Browne accompanied her to New York, and saw her on board the ship,
and on his return home reported that he had left her in the cabin "a
smellin' of and admirin' a basket of flowers most as big as herself,
which she said a very dear friend had ordered sent to her with his
love."

"She didn't say who 'twas," he continued, "and I didn't ask her, but I
thought 'fool and his money soon parted,' for they'd smell awful in a
day or two, and be flung into the sea. She giv' me one of the posies for
Allen. I guess it's pretty well jammed, for I chucked it into my vest
pocket; here it is," and he handed a faded rosebud to Allen, whose face
was very red, and whose eyes, as they met those of Lord Hardy, betrayed
the fact that he was the very dear friend who had ordered the flowers as
his farewell to Daisy.

PART III.

CHAPTER I.

IN ROME.

The carnival was raging through the streets of Rome, and the Corso was
thronged with masqueraders and lined with spectators--Italians, English,
and Americans--all eager for the sight. Upon the balcony of a private
dwelling, for which an enormous price had been paid because it commanded
a fine view of the street below, sat Miss Lucy Grey, with Grey Jerrold
and a party of friends. Lucy had been in Rome three or four weeks,
staying at a pension, in the Via Nazzionale, which she preferred to the
fashionable and noisy hotels.

Grey, who had taken the trip to Egypt, had only been in Rome a few days,
and as there was no room for him at the pension, he was stopping at the
Quirinal, near by. He had seen the carnival twice before, and cared but
little for it; but it was new to his Aunt Lucy, and for her sake he was
there, standing at her side and apparently watching the gay pageant as
it moved by, though in reality he was scarcely thinking of it at all,
for all his thoughts and interest were centered in the white, worn face
he had seen that morning in a close, dark room at the hotel, where
Bessie McPherson lay dying, he verily believed.

On the night of his arrival at the hotel, which was very full, he had
been given a room on the fourth floor looking into a court, and his rest
had been disturbed by the murmur of voices in the room adjoining his
own.

An Italian voice, which he was sure was a doctor's--a clear, decided,
youthful voice, with a slight Irish brogue, which he knew must belong to
a young girl, and an older, softer voice, often choked with tears, and
occasional