He lifted her in his arms and the women mechanically followed him as he bore her to her room and laid her down upon her little white bed. Then he turned around with the dazed look gone from his white face and a gleam of resolution there instead. "There is some dreadful mystery here," he said, in deep, low tones. "The servants must not know of this. Let them think that she came back with you from Europe. Sydney and Georgie, you may retire to your rooms. Your mamma and I will do all that is necessary." Frightened and weeping the girls went away to their rooms and the fearfully stricken parents went to work to restore life in the exhausted frame of poor little Queenie. They bathed and dressed the wound upon her brow, laved the fearfully discolored throat with arnica, wrung and dried the dripping golden tresses, and lastly Mrs. Lyle removed her soiled, wet garments and robed her in a pretty nightdress. All the while the hapless girl lay still and motionless, without a sign of life save an occasional quiver of the eyelids, and a faint, scarce perceptible throbbing in her wrist. "My dear, you are tired and overcome," Mr. Lyle said to his wife when they had done all that was possible. "Go to your room and rest. I will stay here and watch by our little girl." Mrs. Lyle leaned her head on his shoulder and burst into hysterical weeping. "Oh! what does it mean?" she moaned, wringing her hands. "_Where_, oh! _where_, has Queenie been this past year?" "My dear, we shall know when she revives, if she ever does. Go now and rest," he answered, pushing her gently from the room. He went back to his lonely vigil and watched the weary night through by that silent form upon the bed. Now and then he rose and poured a few drops of wine between the pale, unconscious lips and sat down again with his finger upon the fluttering, thread-like pulse. At length, between the dark and the dawn, Queenie opened her eyes upon his face, sighed, and murmured: "Papa!" He bent over her anxiously. "You are better, darling?" he said. "I am better," she answered faintly. There was silence a little while after that. She lay quite still with her large, hollow eyes fixed wistfully on her father's pale and troubled face as he bent over her, holding her white and wasted hand in both his own. Everything was very still about the house. The storm outside had spent itself, and only now and then the fitful muttering of the "homeless wind" reminded one of the war of the elements that had raged so fiercely a few hours ago. Mr. Lyle's voice, hoarse, trembling, agonized, broke strangely upon the utter stillness: "_Queenie, where have you been all this long, dreadful year?_" Queenie turned her face and buried it in the pillow, and a low sob of utter agony answered him only. Again he repeated the question, this time more firmly and resolutely. "Oh! papa, _must_ I tell you?" she moaned, without lifting her face from its friendly refuge.