The Girl Next Door

-rimmed spectacles, wiped them e

ld was or why she was there? Well-I-never

poken as she did, there could be no further occasion for secrecy. So that night they gave her an entire histor

ut it!" exclaimed Marcia, in surprise. "And here

st, because I was too busy and it seemed as if the people living there were such slack housekeepers. I haven't any sympathy with

ia, again. "And if any one ever heard of a

again. "Then I don't see why sh

ee that. Cecily said she was very good to her the night she was so ill. And then, too, it must have be

rrow," Miss Minerva reminded them. "I'd like to have her here and nurse her myself and feed her up a bit. And that's another strange thing-why should

want to know is why did Miss Benedict allow Cecily to open her shutters to-day when she

hould have sent her over here to the Benedicts' at all, when nobody

case," mused Miss Minerva. "Mrs. Marlowe might have bee

bout it-or at least suspect some su

r aunt. "There must be some ot

Miss Benedict questioned her all about herself-where she came from, and all that. And a

n't you say the child sent you a couple of gifts-l

ht not to have given them away. And yet-I know just how she felt-she wanted to

have parted with this!" Then she laid it down and took up the bracelet. "Gracious!" she exclaimed immediately, letti

ter?" cried bot

ke one I've had put away for years!" The girls stared at her incredulously

iligree-work, a quarter of an inch wide. Here and there, at intervals in the filigree, and forming part of the pattern, were several strange c

flushed and disheveled, from a hunt t

my hand on anything I wanted, at an instant's notice, but in this apartment!"

e trinkets in an expressive silence. Not for a moment could it be doubted that these two bracelets were once a pair. Th

id you get yours?" bre

fered to sell it to him for a small sum, and seeing it was a rather unique little trinket, he bought it and brought it home to me. I never wear such things, however. Jewelry never did appea

one thing I'd give my head to know-this

ut I'm afraid you'll have to wait til

now which is mine and which hers, except that mine is a little more tarnished from having been laid away. Your father said, when he gave

ddenly, "where do you su

se had. It may have passed through dozens of hands after it was taken from the original

the two silver trinkets, lyi

"perhaps to some one connected with Cecily. And to think they should have drifted half