Cynthia, too, had received a letter that day—­a letter which she had read several times, now with a smile, and again with a pucker of the forehead which was meant for a frown.  “Dear Cynthia,” it said.  “Where do you keep yourself?  I am sure you would not be so cruel if you knew that I was aching to see you.”  Aching!  Cynthia repeated the word, and remembered the glimpse she had had of him in the dining room with Miss Janet Duncan.  “Whenever I have been free” (Cynthia repeated this also, somewhat ironically, although she conceded it the merit of frankness), “Whenever I have been free, I have haunted the corridors for a sight of you.  Think of me as haunting the hotel desk for an answer to this, telling me when I can see you—­and where.  P.S.  I shall be around all evening.”  And it was signed, “Your friend and playmate, R. Worthington.”

It is a fact—­not generally known—­that Cynthia did answer the letter—­twice.  But she sent neither answer.  Even at that age she was given to reflection, and much as she may have approved of the spirit of the letter, she liked the tone of it less.  Cynthia did not know a great deal of the world, it is true, but the felt instinctively that something was wrong when Bob resorted to such means of communication.  And she was positively relieved, or thought that she was, when she went down to supper and discovered that the table in the corner was empty.

After supper Ephraim had his letter to write, and Jethro wished to sit in the corridor.  But Cynthia had learned that the corridor was not the place for a girl, so she explained—­to Jethro that he would find her in the parlor if he wanted her, and that she was going there to read.  That parlor Cynthia thought a handsome room, with its high windows and lace curtains, its long mirrors and marble-topped tables.  She established herself under a light, on a sofa in one corner, and sat, with the book on her lap watching the people who came and went.  She had that delicious sensation which comes to the young when they first travel—­the sensation of being a part of the great world; and she wished that she knew these people, and which were the great, and which the little ones.  Some of them looked at her intently, she thought too intently, and at such times she pretended to read.  She was aroused by hearing some one saying:—­“Isn’t this Miss Wetherell?”

Cynthia looked up and caught her breath, for the young lady who had spoken was none other than Miss Janet Duncan herself.  Seen thus startlingly at close range, Miss Duncan was not at all like what Cynthia had expected—­but then most people are not.  Janet Duncan was, in fact, one of those strange persons who do not realize the picture which their names summon up.  She was undoubtedly good-looking; her hair, of a more golden red than her brother’s, was really wonderful; her neck was slender; and she had a strange, dreamy face that fascinated Cynthia, who had never seen anything like it.