“If only—” she repeated idly, opening and closing her fan. It was a frail blue trifle, painted in golden butterflies.

“There are so many ‘if onlies’ that I hesitate to choose; but I will venture one. If only you will come back to St. Agatha’s ! Not to-morrow, or the next day, but, say, with the first bluebirds. I believe they are the harbingers up there.”

Her very ease was a balm to my spirit; she was now a veritable daughter of repose. white sheath lay quiet in her lap; her right hand held the golden butterflies against the soft curve of her cheek. A collar of pearls clasped her throat and accented the clear girlish lines of her profile. I felt the appeal of her youth and purity. It was like a cry in my heart, and I forgot the dreary house by the lake, and Pickering One arm in its long and the weeks within the stone walls of my prison.

“The friends who know me best never expect me to promise to be anywhere at a given time. I can’t tell; perhaps I shall follow the bluebirds to Indiana; but why should I, when I can’t play being Olivia any more?”

“No ! I am very dull. That note of apology you wrote from the school really fooled me. But I have seen the real Olivia now. I don’t want you to go too far—not where I can’t follow—this flight I shall hardly dare repeat.”

Her lips closed—like a rose that had gone back to be a bud again—and she pondered a moment, slowly freeing and imprisoning the golden butterflies.

“You have risked a fortune, Mr. Glenarm, very, very foolishly,—and more—if you are found here. Why, Olivia must have recognized you! She must have seen you often across the wall.”

“But I don’t care—I’m not staying at that ruin up My grandfather meant more to me there for money. than that—”

“Yes; I believe that is so. He was a dear old gentle-man; and he liked me because I thought his jokes adorable. My father and he had known each other. But there was—no expectation—no wish to profit by his friendship. My name in his will is a great embarrassment, a source of real annoyance. have printed dreadful pictures of me. The newspapers That is why I say to you, quite frankly, that I wouldn’t accept a cent of Mr. Glenarm’s money if it were offered me; and that is why,—and her smile was a flash of spring,—"I want you to obey the terms of the will and earn your fortune.”

She closed the fan sharply and lifted her eyes to mine.

“But there isn’t any fortune ! It’s all a myth, a joke,” I declared.