take it some
one else would; and it was an easy way to earn a trifle."

"But if there is anything wrong in the matter it is the hardest way in
the world to get money," I said, perplexed at her words.

Linden Lane lay back from Oaklands a mile or more, and led me on a road I
had never traversed before, although I had often planned to take it on
some of my exploring journeys. But it led away from the sea shore, and
that probably was the reason I had hitherto neglected it. There was a
strip of woodland belonging to the Oaklands estate through which a part
of the road lay. There had been a recent fall of snow and this was still
clinging heavily to the trees, especially to the spruce and hemlocks,
bringing strangely to mind the muffled, mysterious figures of the Sisters
of Charity and Nuns, as I used to see them gliding about the streets of
the old world cities. Here and there interspersed with the evergreens
were beech, and maple, and other hardwood growths, with their graceful
leafless branches stretching up like dumb pleading hands toward the
pitiful sky. I grew so interested seeking out specially picturesque
forest growths, and glimpses into the still woodland depths under the
white snow wraith which I might come again to study more closely, and put
on my canvas, that I so far forgot the business of the hour as to find
myself a half hour after the appointment at still some distance from
Linden Lane. Shutting my eyes resolutely on the rarest bits of landscape
caught now and then through a chance opening in the trees, I walked at my
best speed along the drifted road. Esmerelda had described the cottage so
minutely that I had no trouble in recognizing it. Once past the strip of
woodland, a bend in the road brought me at once into a thick cluster of
houses with a few linden trees bordering the street that had given to it
its rather poetical and alliterative name. One house much more
pretentious than the rest, I at once recognized to be Rose Cottage. I
rang the bell and was so quickly admitted, I concluded the tidy looking
little maid had been posted at the door on the lookout for me. I gave her
my card and inquired for Mrs. Le Grande; a formality quite unnecessary,
as she assured me she knew who I was and that the lady was already
waiting for me.

"Just come this way. She has a parlor upstairs; and my! but its a
stunner."

I received the information in perplexed silence. But the little maid
apparently did not look for en