“My girl was as pure and high-minded as the richest young lady in the land, miss, and she would never stoop to disgrace.” “I hope it may prove so, indeed!” exclaimed Rosalind, from the depths of her jealous heart, and she went away, promising to send her maid with the tailor gown to be pressed. The little cottage with the morning-glory vines all dead, looked dreary and deserted, and poverty-stricken; but poor as it was, the good widow could barely pay the rent. Rosalind could not help but think, as she walked away, that it was a poor setting for the lovely girl who had fled away from it rather than exchange it for the gilded misery of a loveless marriage, such as her mother had proposed. One thing she had told Mrs. Vining earnestly: “If you hear from your daughter, be sure and let me know, and I will make it worth your while. I take a deep interest in little Berry, you know.” Aye, the interest of the hawk in the dove, proud beauty! The mother curtsied in gratitude, and thanked her for her kindness. And just before Christmas she was startled to receive a note from the tailoress, saying she had heard from her little girl at last. She had run away to be an actress, because life in New Jersey was too dull and lonely. She had sent her mother a little money and a pretty picture of herself, and begged her not to be angry, but she was touring in California now, and it would be a long time before she came home again. “In California--Charley’s own State. It looks suspicious,” muttered Rosalind, and she went over to the cottage to visit Mrs. Vining again. But she did not find out anything more, for the letter had been mailed on a train, and Berry failed, perhaps by design, to tell her destination, adding in a postscript: “I don’t ask you to write me, because I am always ‘on the go,’ but I have means you do not guess, of sometimes hearing of your welfare.” “It is through him,” Rosalind thought bitterly, but she concealed her agitation, and congratulated the widow, prettily, on having heard from her daughter. Then promising to send her a handsome Christmas gift, she took leave. Charley Bonair would have given thousands of dollars to know even what Rosalind had heard about Berry; for he had begun to mourn her as dead, and remorse stung like a serpent in his heart. Always remembering that the man from the inn, who had robbed and tried to murder him, belonged to those people, he had decided they must all be cut-throats and robbers, and that Berry had most likely met her death at their hands. With a heavy heart he landed from the yacht at San Francisco, deciding he would join his family there, and little dreaming the surprise awaiting him. CHAPTER IX. BLUE EYES AND BROWN. Senator Bonair’s palatial home in the magnificent city of San Francisco was ablaze with light and gayety that night.