“I’ve known many charming girls. They are all in one class. She is in another. I don’t understand it. I don’t know what it may mean. I tell you this because it may mean everything to me; and I feel it is due you to know it, since your sentiment toward Rosalie seems so strong. Then you can decide what your attitude will be for the remainder of the summer.” Mrs. Bruce regarded him, her lips apart. After a pause he spoke in his ordinary voice. “We planned last evening that the Yellowstone party should go on a picnic to-day with Captain Salter. Do you care to go?” She shook her head. “Nor I. I would give a great deal to have this day, alone.” Again his throat closed. “To mourn! to mourn!” thought Mrs. Bruce, wretchedly. “But I can’t. I must go at once to see the captain, and then up to the inn. Good-by, Madama.” He approached and laid a hand on her shoulder. He realized the blow he had given her. “We must do the best we can,” he said, and left the room. She stood there, long, in the same position. “I wonder,” she thought confusedly, “if I am not the most miserable woman in the world.” After a while she moved, and spoke through a tube which led to the kitchen. She told Alice that she would not need to get any dinner. Then she went to her room and closed the door. Stillness reigned again but for the subdued roar of waves. “Some one will come for her trunk,” she reflected. “If she took a morning train it will have to be expressed.” She held to that thought in the long hours of exhaustion that followed. Some one would come for the trunk, and she must not be asleep. The middle of the afternoon a wagon stopped before the house. Mrs. Bruce was off her bed, alertly. The feet of the expressman sounded on the stairs. Mrs. Bruce met him in the upper hall. To her relief it was a stranger who appeared. “A trunk to go from here?” he said. “Yes.” She led the way. “Is it prepaid?” she asked as he laid hands upon it. “No.” “Sha’n’t I do it then? Where is it to go?” The speaker’s heart beat fast under the careless words. “No, ma’am. No need. Cap’n Salter’s good.” “Captain—” She arrested herself. “Oh, it’s to go to the captain’s.” “Yes, ma’am.” Mrs. Bruce returned to her room and sat on the side of the bed in deep meditation. Betsy might store her possessions in the house of an old friend until her plans were made. The sense of desolation that overtook her as the trunk had disappeared submerged her afresh; and Irving’s words returned to pierce her. Rosalie Vincent—in a class by herself. Her splendid Irving, whose career was to have made her life one pageant of gratified pride. She sank upon her pillows with a groan. Her world was falling about her like a flimsy house of cards. In the evening she heard him come in. He had to pass her room to get to his. She stood in the open doorway. “Did you enjoy your picnic, dear?” she asked, as he appeared.