ought it was Mercedes who was so good to you, and
it was in a way. But it was poor Ernst who really cared. He took to you
the moment he set eyes on you, and he'd liked your father. And he wanted
to have you to live with them and be their adopted daughter and inherit
their money when they died. It had always been a grief to him that
Mercedes wouldn't have any children. She just had a horror of having
children, and he had to give up any hope of it. Well, the moment
Mercedes realized how he cared for you she got jealous and they had a
scene over you right off, in that hotel at Fontainebleau. She took on
like her heart would break and put it that she couldn't bear to have any
one with them for good, she loved him so. It was true in a way. I didn't
count of course. He looked at her, sick and scornful and loving, and he
gave way. That was why you were put to school. She tried to make up by
being awful nice to you when you came for your holidays now and then;
but she never liked having you round much and Ernst saw it and never
showed how much he cared for you. But he did care. You had a real friend
in him, Karen. Well, after that came the worst thing Mercedes ever did."
Mrs. Talcott paused, gazing before her in the dimly lighted room. "Poor
things! Poor Mercedes! It nearly killed her. She's never been the same
since. And it was all her fault and she knows it and that's why she's
afraid. That's why," she added in a lower voice, "you're sorry for her
and put up with everything, because you know she's a miserable woman and
it wouldn't do for her to be alone.

"A young man turned up. His name don't matter now, poor fellow. He was
just a clever all-over-the-place young man like so many of them,
thinking they know more about everything than God Almighty;--like this
young man in a way, only not a bad young man like him;--and downright
sick with love of Mercedes. He followed her about all over Europe and
went to every concert she gave and laid himself out to please her in all
the ways he could. And he had a great charm of manner--he was a Russian
and very high-bred--and he sort of fascinated her, and she liked it all,
I can tell you. Her youth was beginning to go, and the Baron was mighty
gloomy, and she just basked in this young man's love, and pretty soon
she began to think she was in love with him--perhaps she was--and had
never loved before, and she certainly worked herself up to suffer
considerably. Well, the Baron saw it. He saw