And then, as that reminded her of New Haven and Alice Grey, she continued: “We heard from Mr. Roger yesterday, and he said I was to go to school in New Haven, but I don’t want to go there a bit.” “Why not?” the stranger asked; and Magdalen replied: “Oh, because I don’t. Frank is there, and he told me so much about a Miss Alice Grey, and wants me to be like her; and I can’t, and I don’t want to know her, for she would laugh at me, and I should be sure to hate her.” “Hate Alice! Impossible!” dropped involuntarily from the stranger’s lips, and turning upon him her bright eyes, Magdalen said: “Do you know Frank’s Alice Grey?” “I know one Alice Grey, but whether it is Frank’s Alice, I cannot tell. I should devoutly hope not,” was the stranger’s answer; and Magdalen noticed that there was a disturbed look on his face, and that he forgot to resume his cigar, which lay awhile smouldering in the grass, and finally went out. He did not seem disposed to talk much after that, and Magdalen kept very quiet, wondering who he was, until her attention was suddenly diverted into another channel by noticing, for the first time, the absence of the bouquet which she had brought the day before and left upon the grave. “Somebody has stole my flowers! I’ll bet it’s Jim Bartlett. He’s always doing something bad,” she exclaimed, and she searched among the grass for the missing bouquet. The stranger helped her hunt, and not finding it, said he presumed some one had taken it,—that _Jim_ was a bad boy to steal, and Magdalen must talk to him and teach him the eighth commandment. Anxious to confront and accuse the thieving Jim, Magdalen left the graveyard, and was soon engaged in a hot battle with the boy, who denied all knowledge of the flowers, declaring he had not been in the yard for a week, and throwing tufts of grass and gravel stones after her as she finally left him and walked away, wondering, if Jim did not take the flowers, who did. She never dreamed of suspecting the stranger, or guessed that when he left Belvidere there was in one corner of his satchel the veritable bouquet which she had arranged in memory of poor Jessie, or that the sight of those faded flowers had touched a tender chord in his heart, and made him for several days kinder and gentler to a poor, worn, weary invalid, whom nothing in all the world had power to quiet or soothe. CHAPTER X. FRANK AT MILLBANK. Four days later Magdalen received a letter from Frank, who was inconsolable. Alice Grey had left school suddenly, without giving him a chance to say good-by. Why she had gone or where, he did not know. He only knew she _was_ gone, and that he thought college a bore, and New Haven a stupid place, and was mighty glad that vacation was so close at hand, as he wanted to come up to Millbank and fish again in the river.