"My Pine Bough Bedroom!" exclaimed Aunt Cheerful delightedly; "and how glad I am you like it. And I furnished it so, my dear, in a little wave of superstition. An old and wrinkled gypsy was passing through my lane and when I called her in for a cup of tea, what do you suppose she said? 'Kind lady, great happiness will come to you one day in the heart of the Christmas pines!' Doubtless an idle phrase that came to her with the smell of the pine but I often think of it. Good night, my dear." But Jean laid an impetuous hand upon the old lady's shoulder. "Aunt Cheerful," she said gently, "you have not once asked me my name!" "Why neither I have, my dear," nodded Aunt Cheerful, "but then I fancied you would tell me yourself if you wished me to know." Jean colored hotly. "Aunt Cheerful," she said hurriedly, "there are reasons, for a time at least, why--why I can not tell you my name or why I have come to Westowe! Oh, I do hope you will not misunderstand me. May I not," she added pleadingly, "join in name that little group of nobility to which Lord Chesterfield and Lady Cheerful belong?" "Why to be sure, you may!" exclaimed Aunt Cheerful, smiling. "I shall call you the Lady Ariel for you came to me like a beautiful spirit out of the wind and rain. Good night, dear." Very thoughtfully, Jean loosened the shining masses of her dark hair and brushed it. "The Lady Ariel!" she mused, smiling. "And surely as whimsical a guest as any spirit of the air might be." Absently the girl's eyes rested upon a book, exquisitely bound in Levant, on a table near-by. It bore the title "Songs of Cheer" and with a smile at the eternal cheeriness of this chance shelter of hers, the girl opened it. "To my cheerful little mother," read the inscription in a man's bold handwriting, "For every line seems a fragrant breath of her. "ROBERT LORING. "Thanksgiving, Nineteen Eleven." And as the Lady Ariel read, her beautiful face flamed scarlet, and shaking queerly, she dropped to her knees by the snowy bed, all her superb self-possession gone in a passionate fit of weeping. Brush! brush! went the dripping pines against the window in a ceaseless monody, and presently this very strange guest of Aunt Cheerful's raised her head. Very white and strained her face but her eyes were shining. "'The leper no longer crouched at his side,'" she quoted softly; "'But stood before him glorified, Shining and tall and fair and straight As the pillar that stood by the Beautiful Gate. * * * * * And the Voice that was calmer than silence said, "Lo, it is I, be not afraid! In many climes, without avail, Thou hast spent thy life for the Holy Grail Behold it is here!"'" III The Invisible Guest [Illustration] III