He looked into the beautiful and spacious room where he had spent many happy hours with his deceased uncle in years gone by, and a sigh to the memory of those old days breathed softly over his lips, and a dimness came into his bright blue eyes. He brushed it away, and looked around for the beautiful woman who had come between him and the poor old man who had brought him up as his heir. He saw two ladies in the room. One of them was quite elderly, and had gray hair crimped beneath a pretty cap. She wore black silk, and sat on a sofa trifling over a bit of fancy knitting. "That is Mrs. Carroll," he said to himself. "She is a pretty old lady, though she looks so old and careworn. But she is poor, and that explains it. I dare say I shall grow gray and careworn too when Mrs. St. John takes my uncle's money from me, and I have to earn my bread before I eat it." He saw another lady standing with her back to him by the piano. She was _petite_ and slender, with a crown of braided black hair, and her robe of rich, wine-colored silk and velvet trailed far behind her on the costly carpet. She stood perfectly still for a few moments, then turned slowly around, and he saw her face. "Why, it is Xenie herself!" he exclaimed. "Doctor Shirley lied to me, and I was fool enough to believe his silly joke. Heaven! what I have suffered through my foolish credulity! I've a mind to call Shirley out and shoot him for his atrocity!" He remained silent a little while studying the lady's dark, beautiful, smiling face, when suddenly he saw the door unclose, and a lady, dressed in the deepest sables of mourning, entered and walked across the floor and sat down by Mrs. Carroll's side upon the sofa. Howard Templeton started, and a hollow groan broke from his lips. "My God!" he breathed to himself, "I was mistaken. It is Lora, of course, in that bright-hued dress. How like she is to Xenie! I ought to have remembered that my uncle's wife would be in mourning. Yes, that is Xenie by her mother's side, and Doctor Shirley told me the fatal truth!" He walked away from the window, and made several hurried turns up and down before the house. "Shall I go in?" he asked himself. "I know all I came for, now. Yes, I will be fool enough to go in anyhow." He went up the steps and rang the bell, waiting nervously for the great, carved door to open. CHAPTER X. The door swung slowly open, and the gray-haired old servitor whom Howard could remember from childhood, took his card and disappeared down the hallway. Presently he returned, and informed the young man that the ladies would receive him; and Howard, half regretting, when too late, the hasty impulse that had prompted him enter, was ushered into the drawing-room.