as pleased as Punch. Don't tell mamma,' said
Kitty. I keep wondering where it is I have met him; but I know I
cannot have, for they say he is just from England. But you don't know
how queerly he acted. All at once he looked as puzzled as could be;
and by the time he was close to me he stared in the queerest way; and
when Alice introduced us, he bowed, and said, "Haven't we met before,
Miss Tennant?" I said, "I think so;" and said I wished he would help
me remember, for I was very certain I had seen him.

"'Suddenly it seemed to flash into his mind; and he said to himself,
"It couldn't be." But I heard him; and after that he was a perfect
icicle; and I didn't have the courage to ask him any questions, for I
knew it was something horrid by his looks. He evidently mistakes me
for some one, and it is so queer that I firmly believe I have seen
him. He went away from me in a very few minutes, and staid only a
half-hour or so, avoiding Alice all the time. I had promised all the
dances, and was desperately' busy all night, having such a good time
that I quite forgot this unpleasant affair. Alice came to me after the
people were gone away, and said, "Kate Tennant, what did you say to
the poor man?" And she seemed so utterly astonished when I told her
what had happened. She cannot account for it any more than I can, and
says it is as unlike him as possible. I don't know whether I have told
you his name: it is Bruce.'"

When Miss Tennant reached this point in her story, I laughed heartily
(said Aunt Mary); and Anne and she laughed with me. "Why in the world
didn't she know him," said I: "I should have thought the circumstances
would have made her remember him always."

Miss Tennant said, "Indeed, I should have thought so too. I know I
should have recognized him myself if I had seen him; but Kitty was
always the very worst person in the world to remember people, and it
had happened a year before nearly. We always had a great many guests.

"When I answered her letter, I said nothing about him; for I must
confess that I did not recollect that the gentleman who stared so at
Kitty the night she played waiter was Mr. Bruce of London; and,
indeed, I didn't feel particularly interested; and my reply was
probably filled as usual with an account of the exciting things that
had happened to me at the school from which I so earnestly longed for
deliverance.

"Kitty wrote me very often; and once in a while she mentioned this
strange Mr.