Just outside the door of the bank the girl was obliged to raise her veil, as she seemed literally stifling, and the instant she had done so a lady, who had been seated in a motor car at the entrance to the bank, some fifteen minutes before Iris emerged from the building, stepped out of the vehicle and approached her, exclaiming in a soft, well-modulated voice: “I beg your pardon, but are you Maggie Gordon, in the employ of Madam Ward, of Forty-first Street? Yes? How fortunate. I have just driven down from madam’s on the chance of meeting you. Madam told me she gave you a sample of silk to match on your way home. The silk is for my dress, you know, and I chanced to remember that I have two or three yards of the same material at home, so that it would be only a useless piece of extravagance to purchase more. If you will step into the car and drive home with me I will give you the silk, and send my chauffeur with you to madam’s.” Iris merely bowed in token that she was at Clara Neville’s service, and followed the latter to the machine, volunteering no remark as the vehicle drove away, and scarcely once glancing toward her companion, but lying back with closed eyes in a corner of the limousine, with the brown veil again concealing her white, pained face. CHAPTER LV. ISABEL’S BETROTHAL. The handsome residence of Oscar Hilton was ablaze with lights from basement to attic, and from the long parlors issued the sound of merry dance music. It was Isabel’s birthday, and Isabel’s dear five hundred friends had been invited to do honor to the occasion. It must have been almost, if not quite, eleven o’clock, and the festivities were at their height, when a servant made his way through the dancers to the place where his master stood, with such a look of alarm on his face, that every one who chanced to see it knew there was something wrong, or some sad news to be imparted to their host. Hilton himself turned white as death as he saw the man coming toward him. A hush fell upon the assembled guests, and at this most inopportune moment the music ceased, and one could plainly hear the beating of the rain against the windows, one of those sudden storms peculiar to early springtime having arisen unknown to the dancers. The servant was speaking in low, cautious tones to his master, but some of his words came plainly to the ears of the bystanders, among whom were St. John and Isabel. “Miss Iris is outside, sir, an’ she’s sick, I think, fainted dead away. She’s drenched through with the rain--and--and, oh, sir, I think she’s a-dyin’. She just came up the stoop a-holdin’ by the rails, an’ when I opened the door she cried so faintly, sir, ‘mother! mother!’ an’ fell as if dead at my feet before I could catch her. I laid her in the reception room, sir--was that right?--an’ I thought it best to tell you before I frightened Mrs. Hilton.”