less her animosity extends
to me also, and she would not be likely to prove anything that would
personally benefit me."

"You have not a very high opinion of Mrs. Richmond Montague, I perceive,"
Mr. Corbin remarked, with a curious smile.

"I have nothing special against her personally, any further than that I
know she hated my mother, and I do not wish to meet her at present. Why,"
with sudden thought, "could not you try to ascertain from her some facts
regarding my mother's marriage?"

"I might possibly," said Mr. Corbin, gravely, "but that would not benefit
you; you would be obliged to meet her in order to be identified as Mona
Forester's child."

"I had not thought of that," replied Mona, with a troubled look, "and,"
she added, "she could not even identify me to your satisfaction, for she
never saw me to know me as Mona Montague."

"_As Mona Montague!_" repeated the quick-witted lawyer; "does she know
you by any other name? Are you not keeping something back which it would
be well for me to know?"

"Yes; I will tell you all about it," Mona said, flushing again, and
resolving to disclose everything. She proceeded to relate the singular
circumstances which led to her becoming an inmate of Mrs. Montague's
home, together with the incident of finding her mother's picture in one
of her trunks.

"Ah! I think this throws a little light upon the matter," Mr. Corbin
said, when she concluded. "If you had told me these facts at first we
should have saved time. And you never saw this woman until you met her in
her own house?" he asked, in conclusion, and regarding Mona searchingly.

"No, never; and had it not been for the hope of learning something
about my mother's history, I believe I should have gone away again
immediately," she replied.

"I should suppose she would have recognized you at once, by your
resemblance to this picture," remarked her companion.

"She did notice it, and questioned me quite closely; but I evaded her,
and she finally thought that the resemblance was only a coincidence."

"Well, I must confess that the affair is very much mixed--_very_ much
mixed," said the lawyer, with peculiar emphasis, "but I believe, now that
I know the whole story, that the truth can be ascertained if right
measures are used; _and_," he continued, impressively, "if we can prove
that you are what you assert, the only child of Richmond Montague and
Mona Forester, you will not only inherit the money left by Homer
Foreste