"Do my eyes deceive me? What are you doing here, Azuba Aylesford?" The woman in the scarlet robe darted forward, and dragged the white-clad girl into the room, whispering, in terrified tones: "Hush-h! for sweet pity's sake! Do not breathe that name beneath this roof!" She closed the door softly, and they stood looking at each other in wonder and dismay, while Cissy, recovering her wits, retorted, sharply: "By what name shall I call you, then, since your divorce from Mr. Clemens?" "Call me Miss Erroll. Azuba Aylesford and Mrs. Clemens are both dead. From her ashes rises Kate Erroll, governess." "Ah-h!" and Cissy remembered what Geraldine had told her about the governess with a history in her face. She understood it now. Light was also dawning on the other, and she asked: "Is it possible that you, Miss Carroll, are the guest who arrived to-day from New York?" "Yes, but I did not dream of finding you here, Miss--Erroll. When I knocked at the door, I supposed this was Miss Harding's room. My head ached, and I wished to ask for some camphor." "You were mistaken. Her room is on one side of yours, mine on the other, hence the mistake." "I am sorry I disturbed you. I will withdraw now," said Cissy, in her coldest tone, moving toward the door. But suddenly she was prevented from going by Miss Erroll falling madly at her feet. "You shall not go yet--not till--not till--you promise not to betray me to your friends, not to tell them of my wicked past!" she exclaimed. Cissy Carroll drew back her robe from contact with the kneeling suppliant. Her face was very pale, and her eyes flashed with scorn. "Why should I spare you, woman? You did not spare me--nor him!" she answered, bitterly. "That is true--oh, how true! But I have been bitterly punished for my sins--so bitterly that even those I have wronged might pity me. I sinned, but I have suffered!" moaned the kneeling woman, lifting despairing eyes to her accuser. "The way of the transgressor is hard," answered Cissy, with the harshness of woman to woman. "Do I not know it! Alas! alas!" moaned Kate Erroll, and she continued: "Now that I have repented my sins, and am trying to be good, my past rises up to menace me on every hand with danger!" Cissy Carroll did not answer, and she could not pity, for had not this woman robbed her life of happiness? Suddenly Kate Erroll asked, eagerly: "Have you never forgiven Cameron Clemens yet?" "He has never asked me," Cissy returned, evasively. "He would not dare after the scorn with which you dismissed him when I put in my claim to him. Ah, Miss Carroll, you did wrong, and you made my victory an easy one. If you had clung to him he would never have turned to me." Cissy did not answer, save by the curl of a disdainful lip.