right, and I won't peach. But
'twas mean not to tell me."

Quincy looked at her in voiceless astonishment. "What do you mean,
Maude, and where did you gather up all that slang?"

"I might ask you," said Maude, "where you found your wife. I've been
talking to her upstairs. She must have thought that papa and mamma knew
all about it, for she told me who she was, just as easy. Who is she,
Quincy?"

He drew his sister down beside him on a sofa. "She was Miss Mary Alice
Pettengill. She is now known to a limited few, of which you, sister
Maude, are one, as Mrs. Mary Alice Sawyer; but she is known to a wide
circle of readers as Bruce Douglas, the author of many popular stories,
as also of that celebrated book entitled Blennerhassett."

"Is that so?" cried Maude; "why, papa is wild over that book. He's been
reading it aloud to us evenings, and he said last night that that young
man--you hear, Quincy?--that young man, had brought the truth to the
surface at last."

"Now, Maude," said Quincy, "you go right home and keep your mouth shut a
little while longer, and when you are sixteen"--"the ninth of next
January," broke in Maude--"I'll give you a handsome gold watch, with my
picture in it."

"I don't have to be paid to keep your secrets, Quincy," replied Maude
archly, as Quincy kissed her.

"I know it, dear," said Quincy; "I'll give you the watch, not as pay,
but to show my gratitude."

Quincy took an early opportunity to explain to his wife his remissness
in not informing his parents of his marriage, and disclosed to her Aunt
Ella's plan.

On the tenth, Mrs. Chessman's spacious parlor was thronged from nine
till eleven o'clock with bright and shining lights, representing the
musical, artistic, literary, and social culture of Boston. Among the
guests were the Hon. Nathaniel Adams Sawyer, his wife, and his
daughters, Florence and Maude. The surprise of the visitors at the
discovery that Bruce Douglas was a young woman was followed by one of
great pleasure at finding her beautiful and affable.

The reception and entertainment were acknowledged on all sides to have
been most successful, and a thoroughly pleased and satisfied company had
spoken their farewells to author and hostess by quarter-past eleven. So,
when Quincy came up Walnut Street and glanced across at his aunt's
house, a little before twelve, he found the windows dark and the
occupants, presumably, in their beds.

As part of her plan, Quincy had been advise