Rudolph looked not guilty, but grave. “Well” said he, “people don’t hang about a place, at the risk of getting taken up ‘on suspicion of loitering, for the purpose of committing a felony,’ without some reason.” “Why,” cried Mabin triumphantly, “that _is_ the reason! Mrs. Dale has some lovely diamond rings, and the loitering gentleman wants to steal them!” “Well, perhaps you are right,” said Rudolph doubtfully. “I am sure of it!” retorted Mabin resolutely. And she held out her hand. “Good-by, and thank you for your help.” “And you will remember my parable about the Roses?” said he, as he took her hand and thought he liked gray eyes after all better than blue ones. “Perhaps,” said Mabin cautiously, as she hopped away on her crutches. CHAPTER IV. WAS IT A RECOGNITION? While Mabin was still talking to Rudolph in the road between “The Towers” and “Stone House,” a tall parlormaid, in snow-white French cap and ends, passed them, on her way from the former to the latter house, bearing a letter in her hand. And when Mabin reached home, she found that the Powers had already received Mrs. Dale’s invitation to Mabin. In truth it had put both husband and wife into a position of some difficulty. For while, on the one hand, they were delighted at this opportunity of getting “the one too many” off their hands for a time, yet there were the opinions of their neighbors to be considered; and the tide of public feeling had set in strongly against the lady in black. If her hair had been dark instead of fair, it would have made all the difference. The beauty which goes with brown hair and a more or less dark complexion is not so startling, not so sensational, as the loveliness of pink and white and gold which made Mrs. Dale so conspicuous. If again, she had not been in mourning, and such pretty mourning, they would have been readier to make allowance for her eccentricities. But the knowing ones had begun to discover that there were discrepancies in her attire, that her mourning was either too deep for diamond rings to be permissible, or not deep enough for the heavy black veil she wore. So that, in short, it was now almost universally admitted that this person with the too showy carriage and horses, and the dangerously pretty face, was an individual to be avoided, and it was decided that her reluctance to enter the best society of the place, when that society had held out its uninviting arms to her, arose from a wholesome fear that the wise women of the place would “find her out.” Mr. Rose read Mrs. Dale’s note twice through, very slowly, as if trying to discover hidden meanings in its simple words. Then he looked at his wife, who was watching him rather anxiously. “Well, my dear, and what do you think?” asked he.