"'No, it isn't very strange when you think--' and then stopped very suddenly and flushed quite red. And I asked her what she meant, but she only replied: 'Oh, nothing, nothing, dear! Children often look very different from their parents, not at all like them.' And she wouldn't say any more. I thought it strange for a while, but soon forgot all about it. I can't imagine now what she meant, unless it was--that. The only other thing I remember is this. I asked her one time whether, when I was a tiny little baby, I wore pink or blue bows on my dresses. She was very busy about something at the time and she just said, sort of absent-mindedly, 'I don't know I'm sure.' And then she added, in a great hurry, 'Oh, I don't remember! Pink, I guess.' I thought it strange that she should forget how she dressed me, for she always had a very good memory. But I forgot that, too, very soon. That is all." Marcia and Janet glanced uneasily at each other. The information seemed to confirm their worst apprehensions. But Janet went on: "Just one more question, dear, and we'll stop this horrid inquisition. Can you tell us what was your mother's maiden name, the name of her people?" "Yes," said Cecily. "It was Treadwell. But she hadn't any people left--they were all dead, and she was the last one of her family. But, oh! can't you tell me, girls, why you have had to ask all these questions? I have waited so patiently, and I have worried so about it all. And what you have said to-day has made me feel worse than ever." "Dear heart, we don't want to tell you quite yet," soothed Marcia. "It wouldn't do you any good to know about it till we're positive beyond a doubt. It isn't anything so very terrible, anyhow. Nothing to worry about at all. But just something we wish might be a little different. And nothing could possibly make the least difference in the way we care for you, anyway, so just don't worry another bit. Now I'm going to play for you." And she drew her violin from its case. Marcia gave them quite a concert that afternoon, rendering selection after selection to please them, glad indeed of the diversion and relief from the unpleasantness of their accomplished task. But she did not play the "Träumerei," for some reason not very well defined even to herself, but vaguely connected with recent disclosures. At last Cecily herself asked for it, and then, of course, Marcia could not refrain from obliging her. When it was over, Cecily took her departure, and the girls, left alone, plunged at once into the discussion of the most recent developments of the mystery. That evening Captain Brett and the two girls held a council of war.