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30 be paler when she was in her coffin. If they had just known why I turned so pale!

“It’s impossible!” I said blankly.

“It’s really true,” said Wilhelmina, delighted at this development, as she supposed it, of my romance. “I was up to see Mrs. Maxwell last night, and I met him.”

“It — can’t be — the same — Cecil Fenwick,” I said faintly, because I had to say something.

“Oh, yes, it is. He belongs in Blakely, New Brunswick, and he’s a lawyer, and he’s been out West twenty-two years. He’s oh! so handsome, and just as you described him, except that his hair is quite gray. He has never married — I asked Mrs. Maxwell — so you see he has never forgotten you, Miss Holmes. And, oh, I believe everything is going to come out all right.”

I couldn’t exactly share her cheerful belief. Everything seemed to me to be coming out most horribly wrong. I was so mixed up I didn’t know what to do or say. I felt as if I were in a bad dream — it must be a dream — there couldn’t really be a Cecil Fenwick! My feelings were simply indescribable. Fortunately every one put my agitation down to quite a different cause, and they very kindly left me alone to recover myself. I shall never forget that awful afternoon. Right after tea I excused myself and went home as fast as I could go. There