speak, but her throat is parched, and dry. She only
bends her head and gazes at the lines in her pink palm.

"You are going on a journey very soon," vouchsafes the stranger. "I
wish it could be prevented, for it brings more pain than
pleasure--misery, desolation."

Eleanor snatches away her hand.

"I don't want to know any more," she says, almost fiercely, pulling on
her glove.

"I did not mean to frighten you," replies the woman penitently. "But I
want to warn you. Whatever you do wrong in this world, my friend, is
always repaid. There may be a heaven and a hell in the hereafter, I
know not, I am not in a position to say, but of one thing I am certain,
there is the hell here on earth, which measures out the allotted
punishment to its victims."

"I don't understand you," exclaims Eleanor, "You talk to me as if I
were a criminal."

"No," shaking her head sadly; "only as to a young and beautiful wife,
who dreams and cries over another man's picture. You have the fatal,
dangerous gift of fascination, Mrs. Roche."

"How did you know my name?"

"It is by me on the label of your bag."

Eleanor is silent. She waits for the stranger to continue.

"In my youth, Mrs. Roche, I was as fair as you--I was unhappily
married. I looked lightly on the bonds that meant so much until they
fettered me--held me down, as I then imagined. Between me and my
husband the sentiment of _camaraderie_ never existed. When I was not
coquetting with him I was quarrelling. I tell you this because I shall
never see you again. You do not know me--or care. I may be dead
to-morrow--you would never hear. We are only just passing in life, and
have paused to speak. The man I married was by necessity a preoccupied
breadwinner, and during his daily absences in hot pursuit of the staff
of life I met--well, we will say this man," taking up the photograph of
Carol Quinton.

Eleanor snatches it from her.

"Ah! yes, just what I should have done then. I was hot-headed, and
reckless, I had a good life in my hands and I ruined, spoiled,
destroyed it! The cruel thongs of public opinion lashed my quivering
flesh, the galling retribution broke my spirit, I cried to God, but He
hid his face, I was an outcast, lost, I could only lie and moan for
death which never came."

The stranger covers her face with her hands, and shudders visibly.

The wedding-ring to which she has no right is still on her wasted
fingers, hot tears, forced from her e