“No; and that was what I wished to consult with you about,” replied Mrs. Marston, shifting uneasily for an instant beneath his glance. Then she lifted her head proudly and met his eyes with calm hauteur. “You wish to leave it out to nurse, perhaps, and desire me to suggest some proper person,” observed Dr. Turner, trying to explain her conduct thus. “No,” answered the lady, coldly. “I wished to ask if you could recommend some institution in the city where I could put her, and where she would receive proper care.” Dr. Turner regarded the woman with amazement. “Institution, madame! What kind of an institution?” he asked, aghast. “Some public institution, or some home for homeless children,” she answered, not a muscle of her beautiful face moving. “I really do not comprehend you,” the physician said, almost ready to believe that he was in the presence of a lunatic, for surely no mother in her right mind could think of abandoning her child in such a heartless way. “Indeed, I thought I made an explicit statement,” remarked Mrs. Marston, haughtily. “However the child is not to go with me. There are reasons—imperative reasons—that compel me to dispose of her——” “Abandon her, do you mean?” questioned the physician, sternly. The lady shrugged her shapely shoulders and made an impatient gesture, as if the subject and object were alike distasteful to her. “If you choose to put it in that disagreeable way, I suppose I shall have to accept the term,” she replied, coldly. “But you have not answered my question. Do you know of a home for orphans where she would be received and where I might safely leave her? I would make it an object for any such institution to take her.” CHAPTER II. A MONSTROUS PROPOSITION. Dr. Turner did not immediately reply. He was so indignant, so overcome by the startling and unnatural proposition that he was rendered speechless. The knowledge that this woman, so beautiful and gifted, and who had, to all appearance, unlimited wealth at her command, should desire to cast her offspring adrift upon the world, coldly throwing her upon the indifferent care of strangers, was simply horrible to him. The mystery, which, from the first, he had instinctively recognized as attaching itself to this woman, was thickening about her. There must, he thought, be some terrible secret connected with her life, which she was anxious and bound to conceal, or she never could have contemplated such an unfeeling act, and he could think of but one contingency that would compel her to adopt such extreme measures.