None knew of her last night's visit except her father and Charlie, and as her father did not mention it and Charlie had not yet appeared, she was not annoyed with the questions and expressions of wonder which she had hardly hoped to elude. Mabel was not at church, neither was she at school next day, an excuse being sent for her absence, stating that she was confined to the house with a slight attack of influenza. Minnie's excitement of Saturday night, thus augmented by anxiety on her friend's behalf, now began to tell upon her, so much, indeed, that before the work of the school was over, every one observed its effect in her heightened colour, and the unnatural brightness of her eyes round which dark circles had formed. They all attributed it to Mabel's illness and did not think it necessary to enquire into the cause of her apparent feverishness, so that she got away from school also without being embarrassed by troublesome explanations. She went straight from school to Mabel's, running all the way in her anxious haste. The fresh wind and the exertion of running had a beneficial effect upon her, both physically and mentally, for by the time she arrived at Mr. Chartres' door, the feverish flush was replaced by a healthy glow, and the strange, indefinable feeling of restlessness which had all day possessed her, seemed to have been swept away by the breath of the wind. Mabel was still in bed, her aunt informed Minnie, though in her opinion, she was considerably better, and requested her to go up herself to Mabel's bedroom. Minnie needed no second invitation, but immediately flew upstairs, and opening the door softly, peeped in before she entered. She was lying with her eyes closed, but the opening of the door, quietly though it was done, caused her to unclose them again just as Minnie looked in. She looked very pale and exhausted, but brightened up wonderfully under the influence of Minnie's cheerfulness, and was altogether so much better by the time for her departure, that she felt persuaded she would be able to attend school again on the morrow. "That notion about influenza, you know," she remarked confidentially to Minnie, "was nothing more than a delusion on aunt's part. I have really no more influenza than she as herself, but she must have some reason for my being ill, and there would be no use contradicting her, unless I could supply a reason myself, which I can't. I thought it just as well to let it be influenza as anything else." Minnie agreed that perhaps it was, and conjuring her to "shake herself up" and be out to-morrow, departed. That night, after tea she was sitting in the parlour with her two brothers, Archie and Seymour, the one of whom, Seymour, was older than she, and the other, Archie, a year younger.