"I thought you would not," said Miss Blair. "Then there is something else." Maria waited quiescent. "Your name is on the ship's list of passengers as Miss Elizabeth Blair. You are my adopted daughter." Maria started. "Adelaide does not remember that you were called Miss Ackley," said Miss Blair. "She will never remember that you were anything except my adopted daughter. She is a model maid. As for the others, Louise is a model, too, and so is the coachman. The footman is discharged. When we return, nobody in my house will have ever known you except as Elizabeth Blair." Miss Blair went out of the state-room walking easily with the motion of the ship. She was a good sailor. The next afternoon Maria was able to sit out on deck. She leaned back in her steamer-chair, and wept silently. Miss Blair stood at a little distance near the rail, talking to an elderly gentleman whom she had met years ago. "She is my adopted daughter Elizabeth," said Miss Blair. "She has been a little ill, but she is much better. She is feeling sad over the death of a friend, poor child." It was a year before Maria and Miss Blair returned to the United States. Maria looked older, although she was fully as handsome as she had ever been. Her features had simply acquired an expression of decision and of finish, which they had not before had. She also looked more sophisticated. It had been on her mind that she might possibly meet her step-mother abroad, but she had not done so; and one day Miss Blair had shown her a London newspaper in which was the notice of Ida's marriage to a Scotchman. "We need not go to Scotland," said Miss Blair. The day after they landed was very warm. They had gone straight to Miss Blair's New York house; later they were to go to the sea-shore. The next morning Maria went into Miss Blair's vanity room, as she called it, and a strange look was on her face. "I have made up my mind," said she. "Well?" Miss Blair said, interrogatively. "I cannot let him commit bigamy. I cannot let my sister marry--my husband. I cannot break the laws in such a fashion, nor allow them to do so." "You break no moral law." "I am not so sure. I don't know where the dividing-line between the moral and the legal comes." "Then--?" "I am going to take the train to Amity this noon." Miss Blair turned slightly pale, but she regarded Maria unflinchingly. "Very well," said she. "I have always told you that I would not oppose you in any resolution which you might make in the matter." "It is not because I love him," said Maria. "I do love him; I think I always shall. But it is not because of that." "I know that. What do you propose doing after you have disclosed yourself?" "Tell the truth." "And then what?" "I shall talk the matter over with Wollaston and Evelyn, and I think they can be made to see that a quiet divorce will straighten it all out."