“Mrs. Barry is here. Shall we not tell her of her niece’s treachery?” exclaimed Mrs. Laurens, indignant at the fraud that had been practiced on them all, and remorseful and ashamed at the part she had taken in persecuting Cecil’s wife. “Can we not spare poor, ambitious Louise?” exclaimed John Keith, almost pleadingly. The velvet curtains parted, and Mrs. Barry, sterner and grimmer and uglier than ever, stepped inside the room. “No, you can not spare your wicked wife, John Keith! Mrs. Barry has heard all!” she exclaimed, angrily. At that moment the parlor door opened quickly, and Louise Barry, Dot, Doctor Laurens and his wife, Nina and her husband, Mr. Wentworth, came trooping gayly into the room from some out-door expedition that had flushed their faces, tossed their hair, and made them all very bright and happy. Mrs. Barry raised her long, bony forefinger and pointed angrily at Louise. “There, John Keith, is your false wife,” she said grimly. “But she is no longer niece or heiress of mine!” CHAPTER XLIV. Perhaps Louise had dreaded this scene for years; perhaps she had tutored herself to meet it with calmness. She paused in the center of the room and contemplated the striking scene like one thunderstruck, for a moment, then she crossed gracefully to her aunt’s side and grasped her arm. “Dear Aunt Thalia, what does this mean? Why is Molly Trueheart’s husband here? How _dare_ he come here?” looking expressively at Cecil. He returned her glance with scorn. “Spare yourself the trouble of prevarication, Miss Barry; your treachery is fully known. Four years ago you made my wife the heroine of a parlor scene. Now, the tables are turned, and you find yourself in the same position.” She stared with apparent innocence at his angry face, carefully avoiding John Keith’s eyes. “I deny that I have been guilty of any treachery,” she said defiantly. Mrs. Barry caught her roughly by the shoulder and whirled her around to face her accuser. “Look at that man! Do you deny that you are his divorced wife?” she asked scathingly. Louise scanned his face with sullen fury. “I deny it, yes!” she exclaimed loudly, emphatically. “That man was once married to my step-sister, Molly Trueheart. I have never been married at all!” The loud, angry voice penetrated the back parlor, and the child upon the floor with the book sprang up with a low murmur of delight. She ran to the curtains, swept them aside with a touch of her little hand, and bounded into the room. For a moment she was disconcerted at the sight of all those strange and wondering faces. She exclaimed eagerly: “I thought I heard mamma’s voice!” The next moment she caught sight of Louise glowering at her father, and rushed precipitately forward. “Mamma! mamma!” she exclaimed joyously, and flung her little arms fondly around the tall, stately woman. There was a minute’s intense silence as Louise’s glaring falsehood was thus set at naught by the sweet lips of her child.