"Besides, your father might not understand why you're wandering around the house with me in the middle of the night, even though we are going to be married tomorrow. That outfit you're wearing is subject to a lot of misinterpretation." * * * * * Elaine matched his smile with one of her own. She smoothed the diaphanous, curve-revealing negligee that displayed her charms to such advantage. "Oh, he'd understand, all right," she retorted. "Only I'm afraid he'd understand a lot of things that aren't true." She gave vent to a dolorous sigh that the merriment sparkling in her blue eyes denied. "Father's all French, you know. He's quick to understand situations where young ladies appear _en deshabille_." They turned to go. But again the Vance mirror caught Mark's eye. "Strange-looking affair, isn't it?" he commented. Elaine nodded. Drawing a comb from some place of concealment about her, she seated herself on a bench before the glass. A unique creation, that mirror. Circular and fully three feet in diameter, it now stood propped on top of a boudoir table. At first glance its surface somehow gave an impression of queer, concentric waves rippling through it. Yet the reflections it threw back were true; perfect. The frame was just as paradoxical. It looked as if it once had been garishly ornate. Now, however, age had transmuted gaudiness to an indefinable antique charm. "Isn't it lovely?" breathed Elaine. She drew the comb through her hair. Watched the mirror and the moonlight transform its golden beauty to a rippling cascade of silver. Mark stared, fascinated, over her shoulder. "The moonlight's beautiful tonight, Mark!" the girl murmured. "It makes my hair dance in the glass like the waves of the sea." Her voice faded to nothingness. Her eyes were half-closed. "Your hair is always beautiful, Elaine," her lover whispered, "and it's no lovelier than all the rest of you, every inch." A moment's hesitation. "But we've got to get to bed, darling. There'll be so much running around tomorrow--" "_Mark!_" Shock was in that sudden exclamation. Shock, and a little lilt of panic. It burst from Elaine's half-parted lips like the _thunk_ of a bullet slamming into a hardwood board. The man jerked to attention. Caught the girl's smooth shoulders in his big hands. "Elaine! What is it?" "Look! The mirror!" "The mirror?" Mark Carter's puzzled brown eyes sought the gleaming surface of the glass. "What--?" "The reflection! Look!" Mark stared. Went suddenly tense in stark amazement, eyes wide. * * * * * For there, gazing back at him out of the mirror, was a new Elaine. An Elaine who stood beside a great black coach, the like of which had never rolled American highways. [Illustration: There in the mirror was an image that was NOT a reflection!]