She opened the door between the rooms quietly, and went in, leaving a crack that she might hear any movement on the part of her patient.  She crossed the sitting room in the dark.  Reaching the bedroom she pulled the chain of the lamp, then set a screen to hide any ray of light which might escape.

The room was furnished with a feeling for delicate color—­gold and ivory—­Japanese prints—­pale silks and crepes—­a bit of jade—­a cabinet inlaid with mother-of-pearl.  But Hilda’s eyes were not for these.  Indeed, she knew nothing of their value, nothing, indeed, of the value of the Chinese scroll which so effectually hid the panel in the wall.

Within the safe was a large velvet box, and several smaller ones.  It was from the big box that Hilda had taken the miniature, and it contained also the crown which she yearned to wear.

She called it a crown!  It was a tiara of diamonds, peaked up to a point in front.  There was, also, the wide collar of pearls with the diamond slides which had been worn by the painted lady on the stairs.  In the smaller boxes were more pearls, long strings of them; sapphires like a midnight sky, opals, fire in a mist; rubies, emeralds—.  They should have been locked in a vault at the General’s bank, but he had wanted nothing taken away, nothing disturbed.  Yet with that touch of fever upon him he had given the key to Hilda.

She took off her cap and turned in the neck of her white linen gown.  The pearl collar was a bit small for her, but she managed to snap the three slides.  She set the sparkling circlet on her head.

Then she stood back and surveyed herself in the oval mirror!

Gone was the Hilda Merritt whom she had known, and in her place was a queen with a crown!  She smiled at her reflection and nodded.  For once she was swayed from her stillness and stolidity.  She loaded her long hands with rings, and held them to her cheeks; then, struck by the contrast of her white linen sleeve, she rummaged in one of the big closets, and threw on the bed a drift of exquisite apparel.

The gowns were all too small for her, but there was a cloak of velvet and ermine.  The General’s wife had worn it to the White House dinner over the gown in which she had been painted.  Hilda drew the cloak about her shoulders, and laughed noiselessly.  She could look like this, and she had never known it!  But now that she knew—!

There was the soft click of the telephone in the General’s room.  Fearful lest the sound should waken her patient, she tore off the tiara, turned up the neck of her dress to hide the shining collar, dropped the cloak, pulled the chain of the lamp, then sped breathless to the shadowed room.

Dr. McKenzie was at the other end of the wire.

“I am coming over, Hilda.”

“You need not,”—­her voice was a whisper—­“he is sound asleep.”

“I want to see you for a moment.  It is very important.”