ond, they were so small and even. The outside of her might have
belonged indifferently to north, south, east, or west, but the inside of
her was Celtic to the core. Both Irish and Highland blood ran in her
veins, and unknown ancestors had handed down to her that heritage of
laughter and tears, that joyous zest of life and keen intensity of
feeling, that fairy glamour which may transfigure the commonest things,
or beguile the heart to waste its devotion upon trifles, which is the
birthright of those whose forbears, in the dim forgotten twilight of our
island's history, kept their courts at Tara and Camelot and left their
wealth of legend behind them.

Lesbia lived in a house in Denham Terrace with her stepbrother Paul
Hilton. Fate had tossed her about like a tennis ball, though so far
always kindly. Her own father had died when she was a baby, and while
she was still quite tiny her mother had been married again to Mr.
Hilton, a widower with a son of twenty. In his vacations from college
Paul had made rather a pet of his little stepsister, and later on his
kindness was put to a practical test. An epidemic of virulent influenza
swept away in a single week both Mr. and Mrs. Hilton, and Lesbia, at
eight years old, found herself an orphan. She had no very near
relations, and the third and fourth cousins whom she possessed were not
at all anxious to adopt her, so Paul, practical, unimaginative,
common-sense Paul, took over the responsibility of her maintenance as a
matter of course. Neither he, nor the pretty little bride whom he soon
brought home, understood Lesbia in the least, her temperament held
unknown qualities which their more direct minds could never grasp, but
they were good to her, and accepted her without question as a member of
the household, and as much a legacy as the family furniture.

The memory of her early days had grown rather hazy, and Lesbia was so
accustomed to Paul and Minnie and the three small children who had
arrived at Denham Terrace that no other life felt particularly possible.
She was happy at school, and she rubbed along well at home. There was
not surely a girl in her form who could claim more.

This first day of the new term had seemed fortunate to Lesbia. She had
been raised to the honour of VA instead of being relegated with more
backward girls to VB, a contingency she had dreaded but half
anticipated, and she had secured the very desk she had coveted for
years. She came downstairs therefo