was stronger. He did not resent my care of him, but accompanied me home. Had I noted anything strange, I should have reconciled the strange phenomenon with what I believed was my patient's condition."

Dr. Ellis here took time to recover himself, and remained looking passively out of the window, until Adelina asked:

"Where, then has Ralph been all of this time? In Australia?"

Now that she had heard all, she seemed unable to take the evidence her aural sense had given her.

"Yes, he has been in Australia until a few months ago. Hereafter, I shall require of every man his brother's name before making his acquaintance."

"How did Ralph take it when you had told him all?" asked Adelina.

"He was disinclined to believe the whole story, of course. After I had succeeded in convincing him of its authenticity, he simply said, 'What a friend you have been.' You can imagine how I felt. To have believed such things of a friend, and to be exalted for it, too, made me very uncomfortable. The dear fellow forgave. I felt it in a single grasp of the hand. Then he left me at break-neck speed, his usual way when he is agitated."

"But how is it that we never heard from Ralph, at all? I mean the real Ralph."

"Pardon me," said the doctor, looking towards Miss Tracy, "he did write, and, in turn, wondered at the silence in your quarter."

"The letter was not received—if it only had been," said Mary, with a sigh. "After all, the whole trouble comes from the loss of two letters; the one to you, Dr. Ellis, and the one to us."

"The letter was accompanied by a small photograph of Ralph, which would immediately have disclosed to all of you the singular resemblance between the two brothers."

"Well, what made Ralph persist in thanking us for caring for his brother? How did he know that he had ever been in Deanmouth?" asked Mr. Tracy.

"I think that was learned from mutual friends just before his arrival; otherwise, he would have telegraphed the news of his brother's death. At that time he was not aware of your kind attention to Edward."

"I must be very obtuse," said Adelina, "but I seem unable to take it all in. How was it you discovered Edward at all?" she asked, turning to Harold and Mary.

"Notices appeared in the papers," answered Harold, "to which we paid little attention at first, even though the name was precisely that of Ralph; however, when the notices continued to appear and the friends of the young man palpably declined to come forward, it occurred to us that the matter should be investigated. It was, and behold the result. I wonder now, if in answering the advertisements, we did not do it almost entirely from feelings of sentimentality. We soon thought ourselves justified in pursuing inquiries, and yet, how wrong was the conclusion we drew."

"I think I see the subject of our talk now," interposed the doctor, "surely, some one ought to go and meet him."

His hand approached his face with a futile attempt to hide the smile which would come. Adelina's face was soon mantled with a slight blush; but, nevertheless, she bravely rose and made a motion to act upon the suggestion, knowing that all eyes were upon her, and that the doctor's remark was made more from a desire to note the effect of it than from any expectation that it would be materialized.

"As we are the ones who have unintentionally wronged Ralph, surely, we are the ones to make the reparation to him, poor boy," said Adelina.

The "poor boy" was said as though "poor dear" was what was really meant. That interpretation may only have been from undue exercise of the imaginative faculty—we shall not presume to say. No one would have denied the allegation more firmly or indignantly than Adelina. At any rate, she did not seem to weigh long the question as to which one of the party was the one to make the advances. If the opportunity was fortuitous, it was at least most desirable for herself and Ralph, but we shall come to that later.

It was not easy for the girl to go immediately to Ralph, but the desire to talk with him was the dominant sensation, and lesser ills gave way to personal desire. It would almost have appeared that the suggestion of Dr. Ellis was premeditated, and not wholly disinterested, for ere long Miss Tracy and he were seen going in the opposite direction from the way Adelina had taken. At Harold's instigation, Mary had exchanged letters with Dr. Ellis, but they pertained only to the condition and affairs of Edward Bamford. This scarcely justified the doctor in his sudden interest in his unknown correspondent who was at present a most desirable companion, in his opinion. Had the letters been of a personal character, Mary might unconsciously have made them contain a clue, and probably an interesting one, to her individuality. There was really nothing to inspire special interest, unless a thorough knowledge of orthography and rhetoric would count. It seems they did, or was it something else that had transpired? And they did not talk of Ralph now. Perhaps the reason for that was they had been discussing him for so long.