ot to speak about the events which occurred in the first year of your
life, but I am going to break through my rule to-day. Dr. Severn, whom
you met this afternoon, believes that he can throw some light upon
your early history, and even solve the mystery of your birth. From
what he tells me a very strange chain of circumstances has led him to
make enquiries, and it seems more than probable that you may learn
something at last. Try and calm yourself, my dear child, and let Dr.
Severn look at the locket which you have brought."

Poor Mercy was trembling with agitation. Was her long-deferred hope
at length to be realized? Ever since she had been old enough to notice
the difference between herself and other girls, she had looked forward
to this, at first with eager expectation, but latterly as a dream
never likely to be fulfilled and only leading to perpetual
disappointment. All the cherished castles in the air which she had
striven so bravely to put away from her, all the longing and yearning
which she had so often felt for those unknown parents of her infancy,
all the grief, the solitude, and the shrinking sense of her lonely
position rose up in renewed force as, with shaking fingers, she laid
her Chinese charm in the doctor's outstretched hand.

Dr. Severn had removed his own locket from his watch chain, and he now
placed the two side by side on the table.

"You observe, Miss Kaye," he said, "that they are so exactly alike
that it would be impossible to tell them apart, but when they are
together you may notice that there is a slight difference in the
characters which form the centre. To one unacquainted with Chinese it
is perhaps hardly perceptible, but if you had any knowledge of the
written language it could not fail to strike you. This, however, is
only one of the minor points. I have still to make the great test."

He took his own locket in his hand and pressed a secret spring. It
opened, disclosing inside a small coloured photograph of a lady with a
sweet face and fair hair, at which he asked both Miss Kaye and Mercy
to look carefully. He then lifted the other locket from the table.

"If, as I believe, this is the true duplicate," he said, "the spring
will be here, and it will open like its fellow."

The three spectators held their breath. Sylvia was white as a ghost,
and Miss Kaye put her arm round Mercy to prevent her from falling. One
swift pressure of the doctor's thumb, and the charm had flown open,
reve