It was not long after the affair of the five hundred dollars, and Miss Pritchard had wondered if the difficulty might not be somehow connected with that. She had just reached the decision to question the girl when suddenly the weariness, the sadness, the pensiveness, the shadow, vanished utterly, leaving Elsie not only herself again, but even more glowingly and infectiously happy and buoyant than before. And from that moment until this morning at the breakfast-table she had remained so. It was natural that now Miss Pritchard's mind should hark back to those former suspicions. All day she vacillated between the fear that Elsie was beset by some secret trouble or by the solicitations of some unscrupulous person, and the apprehension that she was on the verge of nervous exhaustion. Her face was anxious indeed as she left the office that night. She opened the door of her sitting-room with strange sinking of heart. Then she almost gasped. Her breath was almost taken away by sheer amazement. Elsie was waiting for her--yet another Elsie. For, radiant and sparkling as the girl had been, she had never before been like this. She was fairly dazzling. If Miss Pritchard hadn't been almost stunned, she would have made some feeble remark about getting out her smoked glasses. CHAPTER XXVI "My dear child, what has happened?" Miss Pritchard cried as Elsie relieved her of her wraps and bag, and she dropped weakly into a chair. "I believe your dimples have actually doubled in size since morning. It's positively uncanny, you know, anything like that. Suppose it should go further?" "Like the Cheshire cat's grin? Well--we should worry, Cousin Julia, dearest. But--what do you think has happened, truly?" "Your friend from Enderby hasn't appeared?" "No, this is another sort of bliss. This is--well, dearest darling, it's just that Mr. Coates has started me on something that--that I could go on the stage with!" Miss Pritchard's face fell. "Oh, Elsie, child, what do you mean?" she asked anxiously. The dimples disappeared but though Elsie spoke quietly, still there was that wonderful lilt in her voice. "Just this. He called me into his office this morning and spoke to me about--my specialty, you know, 'Elsie Marley, Honey.' One day back in the fall I was showing off with that to some of the girls that were eating their luncheon together, and he happened by and made me repeat it. To-day he said he had had it in mind ever since, and had found that he could adapt it and change the music and make it into a regular vaudeville feature. He thinks it's a real crackerjack. He's going to begin right away to give me training in it." For a moment Miss Pritchard couldn't speak. Then she had to stifle what started to be a groan. "Oh, my dear child!" she exclaimed.