"And I do need some one to help me," murmured Estelle. "I am all alone in the world." "You must have relatives somewhere!" insisted Alice. "None that I ever heard of. But then, who knows what might have happened in the life that is a blank to me--in the life that lies beyond that impenetrable wall of the past? "But I mustn't get hysterical again. Just let me think for a moment, so I may tell you my story clearly. I shall be all right in a moment or two." "Let me make you a cup of tea," proposed Ruth. "I'll make some for all of us," and presently the little kettle was steaming over the spirit lamp, and the girls were sipping the fragrant beverage. "Thank you. That was good!" murmured Estelle. "I feel better now. I'll tell the rest of my miserable story to you." "Don't make it too miserable," and Alice tried to make her laugh a gay one. "I won't--not any more so than I can help. I think it will do me good to let you share the mystery with me." "Then it is a mystery?" asked Ruth. "Somewhat, yes. You may think it strange, but I can not think back more than three years--four at the most. I am not at all certain of the time. But go back as far as I can, all I remember is that I was on a large steamer." "On the ocean?" asked Alice. "No, on the Great Lakes. I was going to Cleveland, which I learned when I asked one of the officers." "And didn't you know where you were going before you asked?" Ruth questioned. "I hadn't the least idea, my dear. I might just as well have been going to Europe. In fact, when I first looked out and saw the water, I thought I was on the ocean." "But where did you come from, what were you doing there, where were your people?" cried Ruth. "That's it, my dear. Where were they? I didn't know. No one knew. All I could grasp was the fact that I was there on the boat." "Alone?" "Yes, all alone." "But who bought your ticket--who engaged your stateroom?" questioned Ruth. "That is the queer part of it. I did it myself. When I first became conscious that I was in a strange place I was so shocked that I wanted to scream--to cry out--to ask all sorts of questions. Then I realized if I did that I might be taken for an insane person and be locked up. So I just shut myself in my stateroom and did some thinking. "The first thing I wanted to know was how I got on the steamer, but how to find that out without asking questions that the steamship people would think peculiar, was a puzzle to me. Finally, I decided to pretend to want to change my room, and when I went to the purser I asked him if that was the only room to be had. "'Why no, Miss,' he said, 'but when you came on board and I told you what rooms I had, you insisted on taking that one.' That was enough for me. I realized then that I had come on board alone, and of my own volition, though I had not any recollection of having done so, and I knew no more of where I came from than you do now." "How very strange!" murmured Alice. "And what did you do?"