ld engage on her side to retire to her own chamber, and to say no
more on the terrible subject of the ghost--Magdalen at last secured the
privilege of reflecting uninterruptedly on the events of that memorable
day.

Two serious consequences had followed her first step forward. Mrs.
Lecount had entrapped her into speaking in her own voice, and accident
had confronted her with Mrs. Wragge in disguise.

What advantage had she gained to set against these disasters? The
advantage of knowing more of Noel Vanstone and of Mrs. Lecount than she
might have discovered in months if she had trusted to inquiries made for
her by others. One uncertainty which had hitherto perplexed her was set
at rest already. The scheme she had privately devised against Michael
Vanstone--which Captain Wragge's sharp insight had partially penetrated
when she first warned him that their partnership must be dissolved--was
a scheme which she could now plainly see must be abandoned as
hopeless, in the case of Michael Vanstone's son. The father's habits
of speculation had been the pivot on which the whole machinery of
her meditated conspiracy had been constructed to turn. No such
vantage-ground was discoverable in the doubly sordid character of
the son. Noel Vanstone was invulnerable on the very point which had
presented itself in his father as open to attack.

Having reached this conclusion, how was she to shape her future course?
What new means could she discover which would lead her secretly to
her end, in defiance of Mrs. Lecount's malicious vigilance and Noel
Vanstone's miserly distrust?

She was seated before the looking-glass, mechanically combing out her
hair, while that all-important consideration occupied her mind. The
agitation of the moment had raised a feverish color in her cheeks, and
had brightened the light in her large gray eyes. She was conscious of
looking her best; conscious how her beauty gained by contrast, after the
removal of the disguise. Her lovely light brown hair looked thicker and
softer than ever, now that it had escaped from its imprisonment under
the gray wig. She twisted it this way and that, with quick, dexterous
fingers; she laid it in masses on her shoulders; she threw it back from
them in a heap and turned sidewise to see how it fell--to see her back
and shoulders freed from the artificial deformities of the padded cloak.
After a moment she faced the looking-glass once more; plunged both hands
deep in her hair; and,