the loss
of this little 'charm' depressed and excited me. I searched the bed; I
turned over all the bed-clothes; I searched in and outside; at last I gave
up.

'How odious!' I cried; 'somebody has stolen it merely to vex me.'

And, like a fool as I was, I threw myself on my face on the bed and wept,
partly in anger, partly in dismay.

After a time, however, this blew over. I had a hope of recovering it.
If Madame had stolen it, it would turn up yet. But in the meantime its
disappearance troubled me like an omen.

'I am afraid, my dear cheaile, you are not very well. It is really very odd
you should make such fuss about a pin! Nobody would believe! Do you not
theenk it would be a good plan to take a your breakfast in your bed?

She continued to urge this point for some time. At last, however, having
by this time quite recovered my self-command, and resolved to preserve
ostensibly fair terms with Madame, who could contribute so essentially to
make me wretched during the rest of my journey, and possibly to prejudice
me very seriously on my arrival, I said quietly--

'Well, Madame, I know it is very silly; but I had kept that foolish little
pin so long and so carefully, that I had grown quite fond of it; but I
suppose it is lost, and I must content myself, though I cannot laugh as you
do. So I will get up now, and dress.'

'I think you will do well to get all the repose you can,' answered Madame;
'but as you please,' she added, observing that I was getting up.

So soon as I had got some of my things on, I said--

'Is there a pretty view from the window?'

'No,' said Madame.

I looked out and saw a dreary quadrangle of cut stone, in one side of which
my window was placed. As I looked a dream rose up before me.

'This hotel,' I said, in a puzzled way. '_Is_ it a hotel? Why this is just
like--it _is_ the inner court of Bartram-Haugh!'

Madame clapped her large hands together, made a fantastic _chasse_ on the
floor, burst into a great nasal laugh like the scream of a parrot, and then
said--

'Well, dearest Maud, is not clever trick?'

I was so utterly confounded that I could only stare about me in stupid
silence, a spectacle which renewed Madame's peals of laughter.

'We are at Bartram-Haugh!' I repeated, in utter consternation. 'How was
this done?'

I had no reply but shrieks of laughter, and one of those Walpurgis dances
in which she excelled.

'It is a mistake--is it? _What_ is it?'

'All a mistake, o