Page:Elizabeth Jordan--Tales of the city room.djvu/104

 her intently. Outside, a band played national airs as a delicate compliment to the candidate, who had just returned from a trip through the State, and there were already growing shouts for a speech from the enthusiastic townsmen who had assembled to welcome him home.

"If you don't mind," said Mrs. Eddington, with a slight foreign shrug, "I should like to know if there is any special reason for your looking at me so intently."

"Was I staring? I—I beg your pardon," stammered the newspaper woman. "I could n't help it. From the moment I saw you I 've been trying to recall where I could have seen a face like yours before, and it has just come to me. The resemblance is most extraordinary."

"Really," murmured the other woman, with wonder. She had bent down as if to speak to her little son, who stood at her knee, but there was a sudden flash of interest in her eyes.

"Yes," said Miss Herrick, thoughtfully, her eyes still fastened on the other. "It was a nun—the central figure of the most