tarting, and an outcry of amazement checked just
within her open, rounded mouth, she stopped and stood an instant in
the brightly lighted chamber.

Marguerite sat on the bedside exactly as she had come from the
carriage, save that a white gossamer web had dropped from her head and
shoulders, and lay coiled about her waist. Her tearless eyes were wide
and filled with painful meditation, even when she turned to the
alarmed and astonished girl before her. With suppressed exclamations
of wonder and pity the girl glided forward, cast her arms about the
sitting figure, and pleaded for explanation.

"It is a headache," said Marguerite, kindly but firmly lifting away
the intwining arms.--"No, no, you can do nothing.--It is a
headache.--Yes, I will go to bed presently; you go to yours.--No,
no"--

The night-robed girl looked for a moment more into Marguerite's eyes,
then sank to her knees, buried her face in her hands, and wept.
Marguerite laid her hands upon the bowed head and looked down with dry
eyes. "No," she presently said again, "it is a headache. Go back to
your bed.--No, there is nothing to tell; only I have been very, very
foolish and very, very selfish, and I am going home to-morrow.
Good-night."

The door closed softly between the two. Then Marguerite sank slowly
back upon the bed, closed her eyes, and rocking her head from side to
side, said again and again, in moans that scarcely left the lips:

"My mother! my mother! Take me back! Oh! take me back, my mother! my
mother!"

At length she arose, put off her attire, lay down to rest, and, even
while she was charging sleep with being a thousand leagues
away--slept.

When she awoke, the wide, bright morning filled all the room. Had some
sound wakened her? Yes, a soft tapping came again upon her door. She
lay still. It sounded once more. For all its softness, it seemed
nervous and eager. A low voice came with it:

"Marguerite!"

She sprang from her pillow.--"Yes!"

While she answered, it came again,--

"Marguerite!"

With a low cry, she cast away the bed-coverings, threw back the white
mosquito-curtain and the dark masses of her hair, and started up,
lifted and opened her arms, cried again, but with joy, "My mother! my
mother!" and clasped Zosephine to her bosom.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE SHAKING PRAIRIE.

Manifestly it was a generous overstatement for Claude's professional
friend to say that Claude had outgrown his service. It was true only
that