Her voice suddenly became shrill. It rose half an octave with surprise. Her gaze, which had merely been insolent, now became suspicious. She scrutinized Sheila closely. "I didn't know the Balls had anybody living with 'em," she resumed at length. "You ain't been here long, have you?" "Oh, for some time," was the cheerful rejoinder. "They hire you?" "Not--not exactly. You see, I am sort of related to them, too." "A relation of this old Cap'n Ira?" "Of Mrs. Ball." "Huh! Say, what's you name?" "My name is Bostwick," was the composed reply. "You did not mention yours, did you?" "_Bostwick?_" "They call me Ida May Bostwick," said Sheila, demurely smiling, and even then without a suspicion of the vortex into which she was being drawn. "_Ida May Bostwick!_" The visitor rose out of her seat as though a spring had been released under her. Her eyes flattened, distended, and sparked like micaceous rock in the dark. Her hands clenched till the pointed, highly polished nails bit into the palms. "What do you say? _You_ are Ida May Bostwick?" At that moment Sheila Macklin saw the light. It smote upon her brain like a shaft from a great searchlight; a penetrating, cleaving beam that might have laid bare her very soul before the accusing stranger. She staggered, retreating, shrinking, but only for a moment. The pallor that had come into her face left it. Color rose softly under the exquisite skin and there came a haughty uplift of her chin. She stared back into the blazing, greenish-brown eyes of the other, her own eyes unafraid, challenging. "Do you doubt me?" she demanded, with as much composure as though a secure position and a conscience quite at ease were hers. "Who are you? In what way are you interested in my name or in my identity?" "Why, you--you--" The visitor was for the moment stricken speechless. But it was the speechlessness of rage--of wild and uncontrollable fury. Then she caught her breath. "You dirty cheat, you! You stand there and tell me you are Ida Bostwick? You've got gall--you certainly _have_ got gall! "I'd like to know who the devil you are? Comin' right here, wormin' your way into a place that don't belong to you, gettin' on the soft side of my aunt an' uncle, I s'pose, and thinkin' to grab all they got when they die. Oh, I know _your_ kind, miss! "But I'll show you up. I'll let 'em know what's what and who's who. They must be precious soft to take a girl like you in and think she's Ida Bostwick. How _dare_ you?" She stamped her foot. She advanced upon the other threateningly. But the girl she had accused did not retreat. The flush of outrage and that haughty expression were still upon her countenance. She spoke very firmly but in a voice so low that it contrasted the more sharply with the enraged squall of her opponent. She asked: "Who are _you_, if you please?"