for Shannondale, and the check was still attached to the iron handle
when it was put down in the kitchen at Tracy Park, where the utmost
excitement prevailed, the servants huddling together with scared faces,
and talking in whispers of the terrible thing which had happened, while
Mrs. Tracy and the housekeeper, scarcely less excited than the servants,
gave their attention to the dead.

At the end of the rear hall was a small room, where Frank sometimes
received business calls when at home, and there they laid the body,
after the physician, who had arrived, declared that life had been
extinct for many hours.

Seen in the full daylight, she seemed to be at least thirty-five years
of age, and her features, though not unpleasing, were coarse and large,
especially the nose. Her hair was black, her complexion dark, and the
hands, which lay folded upon her bosom, showed marks of toil, for they
were rough and unshapely, though smaller in proportion than the other
members of her body. Her woollen dress of grayish blue was short and
scant; her knit stockings were black and thick, and her leather shoes
were designed fur use rather than ornament. A wide white apron was tied
around her waist, and she wore a small black and white plaided shawl
pinned about her neck.

And there she lay, not a pleasant picture to contemplate, helpless and
defenceless against the curious eyes bent upon her and the remarks
concerning her, as one after another of the villagers came in to look at
her and speculate as to who she was or how she came in the Tramp House.

Among the crowd was Mr. St. Claire, who gave it as his opinion that she
was a Frenchwoman of the lower class, and asked if nothing had been
found with her except the clothes she wore. Harold told him of the
shawl, and cloak, and carpet-bag which he had carried with the child to
the cottage.

'Yes, there is something more--her trunk,' chimed in the baggage-master,
who had just entered the room, trembling and breathless.

'Her trunk! Did she come in the cars?' Frank asked, his hands dropping
helplessly at his side, and his lips growing pale, as the man replied:

'Yes; last night, on the quarter-past-six from New York; and what is
curi's, she got out on the side away from the depot, and I never seen
her till the cars went on, when she was lookin' at a paper, and the
child cryin' at her feet. I spoke to her, but she did not answer, and
snatching up the child, she hurried off, almost on a