er name was pronounced, and Mr. Albert
Jekyl, with his hat courteously removed, advanced towards her.

"I see with what care Miss Dalton protects the roses of her cheeks,"
said he, smiling; "and yet how few there are that know this simple
secret."

"You give me a credit I have no claim to, Mr. Jekyl. I have almost
forgotten the sight of a rising sun, but this morning I did not feel
quite well a headache a sleepless night--"

"Perhaps caused by anxiety," interposed he, quietly. "I wish I had
discovered your loss in time, but I only detected that it must be yours
when I reached home."

"I don't comprehend you," said she, with some hesitation.

"Is not this yours, Miss Dalton?" said he, producing the bill, which had
fallen unseen from her father's letter. "I found it on the floor of the
small boudoir, and not paying much attention to it at the time, did
not perceive the signature, which would at once have betrayed the
ownership."

"It must have dropped from a letter I was reading," said Kate, whose
cheek was now scarlet, for she knew Jekyl well enough to be certain that
her whole secret was by that time in his hands. Slighter materials than
this would have sufficed for his intelligence to construct a theory
upon. Nothing in his manner, however, evinced this knowledge, for he
handed her the paper with an air of most impassive quietude; while,
as if to turn her thoughts from any unpleasantness of the incident, he
said,

"You haven't yet heard, I suppose, of Lady Hester's sudden resolve to
quit Florence?"

"Leave Florence! and for where?" asked she, hurriedly.

"For Midchekoff's villa at Como. We discussed it all last night after
you left, and in twenty-four hours we are to be on the road."

"What is the reason of this hurried departure?"

"The Ricketts invasion gives the pretext; but of course you know
better than I do what a share the novelty of the scheme lends to its
attractions."

"And we are to leave this to-morrow?" said Kate, rather to herself than
for her companion.

Jekyl marked well the tone and the expression of the speaker, but said
not a word.

Kate stood for a few seconds lost in thought. Her difficulties were
thickening around her, and not a gleam of light shone through the gloomy
future before her. At last, as it were overpowered by the torturing
anxieties of her situation, she covered her face with her hands to hide
the tears that would gush forth in spite of her.

"Miss Dalton will forg