"Because Miss May abused and insulted her; told her before some ladies that she was a 'miserable beggar' that you picked up at the hospital, and that you thought it was charity to feed and clothe her till she was big enough to work. The ladies were in the front yard, and the child happened to be sitting by the fountain; she had just come from riding. I was sewing at one of the windows upstairs, sir, and heard every word. When the folks were gone Miss May walks up to her and asks her what she is doing where anybody could see her? Oh, master! if you could have seen that child's looks. She fairly seemed to rise off her feet, and her face was as white as a corpse. She said she had wanted an education; that she knew you had been very kind; hut she never dreamed of taking Miss Pauline's place in your house. She said she would not stay where she was unwelcome; that she was not starving when you took her home; that she knew you were kind and good; but that she scorned--them were the very words, master-- she scorned to stay a day longer where she had been so insulted! Oh, she was in a towering rage; she trembled all over, and Miss May began to be scared, for she knew you would not suffer such doings, and she tried to pacify her and make up the quarrel by telling her she might stay and have an education, if that was all she wanted. But the girl would not hear to anything she said, and told her she need not be frightened, that she wouldn't go to you with the fuss; she would not tell you why she left your house. She went to her room and she got every rag of her old clothes, and left the house with the tears raining out of her eyes. Oh, master, it's a crying shame! If you had only been here to hear that child talk to Miss May! Good Lord! how her big eyes did blaze when she told her she could earn a living!" By the pale moonlight she could see that her master's face was rigid as steel; but his voice was even calmer than usual when he asked: "Are you sure she is now at the asylum?" "Yes, sir; sure." "Very well; she is safe then for the present. Does anyone know that you heard the conversation?" "Not a soul, sir, except yourself." "Keep the matter perfectly quiet till I come home. I shall be away a day, or perhaps longer. Meantime, see that Beulah does not get out of your sight. Do you understand me?" "Yes, sir--I do." The buggy rolled swiftly on, and Harriet returned to the house by a circuitous route, surmising that "Miss May's" eyes might detect her movements. The same night Clara Sanders sat on the doorstep of her tumble cottage home. The moonlight crept through the clustering honeysuckle and silvered the piazza floor with grotesque fretwork, while it bathed lovingly the sad face of the girlish watcher. Her chin rested in her palms, and the soft eyes were bent anxiously on the countenance of her infirm and aged companion.