“Dear me, Hetty, how much you see that common folks like me would never think of!” put in her mother admiringly as the girl paused for breath. Ethel, contrary to her usual good manners, made an impatient movement, and Hetty hastily resumed her narrative. “You see my attention was drawn to her as they came in, for they were a little late, and had some difficulty in finding seats--couldn’t all get together at first; then the resemblance to you, which even mother noticed when I spoke of it to her, and the quick, searching glance she sent round the car--for all the world as you would have done, because you are always looking for your lost mother. She seemed to scan every face, then sat down with, so at least I thought, a weary, disappointed little sigh; and it was then I noticed the pitying tenderness of her husband’s manner. Then the older girl spoke to her, calling her mamma, and I noticed that in her there was a still more striking likeness to you--though only, I think, because she is so much nearer your age.” Ethel had forgotten to eat or drink; she was trembling with agitation. “Oh, is that all?” she asked in tones scarcely audible, as Hetty again paused a moment. “Not quite, dear. The little girl at first sat on her brother’s knee; then a seat was vacated just in front of me, and she took it. I smiled at her, and she smiled back. I was eager to make acquaintance, that I might find out something about them; so presently I leaned over to her and asked if she had been at the sea-shore. She said, ‘Yes, and now we’re going back to the Centennial. We were there a while, but mamma got very tired one day--so tired she and papa couldn’t go in to look at the pictures with Ellis and me, and we went home instead; and we were to go to the picture place the next morning, but mamma was taken very sick in the night, and the doctor said she must go to the sea-shore for a while; so of course we all went.’ “Then she took to questioning me, and telling me about the shells she had picked and the fun she had had in bathing, and what she had seen and expected to see at the Exposition. “I asked her her name, and she said it was ‘Nan’ something; I couldn’t quite catch the last name, but it was a word of two syllables. “Then I sat silent a while, racking my brains to think what I could do to find out whether they really were related to you, and had just decided to tell the child that I knew a young lady who strongly resembled her mother and sister, when some persons left the car, and she changed her seat again for one nearer the rest of the family.” “And that is all?” Ethel said, drawing a long, sighing breath as Hetty ceased. “Yes, dear, all,” Hetty answered regretfully, laying her hand tenderly on her friend’s arm. “I wish for your sake there was something more--something certain.” For a moment Ethel hid her face in her hands; then taking them away, turned toward Hetty, pale, tearful, but with the light of hope shining in her eyes.