“I’m not sure that it’s the worst kind of luck,” returned Demorest, with persistent gravity; “and I suppose he’s satisfied with it.”  But so heterodox an opinion only irritated his antagonist the more, especially as he noticed that the handsome woman in the back seat appeared to be interested in the conversation, and even sympathetic with Demorest.  The man was in the main a good-natured fellow and loyal to his friends; but this did not preclude any virulent criticism of others, and for a moment he hated this bronze-faced stranger, and even saw blemishes in the handsome woman’s beauty.  “That may be your idea of an Eastern man,” he said bluntly, “but I kin tell ye that Californy ain’t run on those lines.  No, sir.”  Nevertheless, his curiosity got the better of his ill humor, and as the coach at last pulled up at the cross-road for Demorest to descend he smiled affably at his departing companion.

“You allowed just now that you’d bin five years away.  Whar mout ye have bin?”

“In Europe,” said Demorest pleasantly.

“I reckoned ez much,” returned his interrogator, smiling significantly at the other passengers.  “But in what place?”

“Oh, many,” said Demorest, smiling also.

“But what place war ye last livin’ at?”

“Well,” said Demorest, descending the steps, but lingering for a moment with his hand on the door of the coach, “oddly enough, now you remind me of it—­at Hymettus!”

He closed the door, and the coach rolled on.  The passenger reddened, glanced indignantly after the departing figure of Demorest and suspiciously at the others.  The lady was looking from the window with a faint smile on her face.

“He might hev given me a civil answer,” muttered the passenger, and resumed his novel.

When the coach drew up before Carter’s Hotel the lady got down, and the curiosity of her susceptible companions was gratified to the extent of learning from the register that her name was Horncastle.

She was shown to a private sitting-room, which chanced to be the one which had belonged to Mrs. Barker in the days of her maidenhood, and was the sacred, impenetrable bower to which she retired when her daily duties of waiting upon her father’s guests were over.  But the breath of custom had passed through it since then, and but little remained of its former maiden glories, except a few schoolgirl crayon drawings on the wall and an unrecognizable portrait of herself in oil, done by a wandering artist and still preserved as a receipt for his unpaid bill.  Of these facts Mrs. Horncastle knew nothing; she was evidently preoccupied, and after she had removed her outer duster and entered the room, she glanced at the clock on the mantel-shelf and threw herself with an air of resigned abstraction in an armchair in the corner.  Her traveling-dress, although unostentatious, was tasteful and well-fitting; a slight pallor from her fatiguing journey, and, perhaps, from some absorbing thought, made her beauty still more striking.  She gave even an air of elegance to the faded, worn adornments of the room, which it is to be feared it never possessed in Miss Kitty’s occupancy.  Again she glanced at the clock.  There was a tap at the door.