far's known to me, respectable householders--"

"But not what my people were," suggested Elizabeth, her whole face alight, her eyes shining with eagerness. "You must tell me who they were--what my rightful name is."

Cousin Hannah groaned. "Looks like I've let the cat out of the bag--don't it? Well, what I've got to tell ain't nigh what you think I've got to tell," she asserted doggedly. "You'll be sorry for askin'."

Through Elizabeth's mind flashed visions of a wonderful ancestry; to do her justice these dream parents did not in any way displace the father and mother she really loved with all her young heart--they were only that vision which comes to us all in some shape when we feel we are misunderstood--different.

Mary's step was heard approaching in the little corridor. She had undoubtedly been disturbed by the sound of their voices, and was uneasy for fear Cousin Hannah would be teased into making in judicious revelations.

"Tell me--tell me quick--" whispered Elizabeth, shaking her room-mate's arm. "Tell me before Mary gets here."

"Well, I will," gasped Cousin Hannah. "You ought to know it--but I warn you it's not what you're expectin'!"

CHAPTER II

Roy Rides to Silver Spur

When Mary stepped into the little bedroom Cousin Hannah Pratt had already spoken.

"Your pa and ma was movers that come here sixteen years ago--movers, like the folks you seen to-day and made such fun of. The name was Mudd."

These whispered words sounded in Elizabeth's ears, and the girl crumpled up on the bed sobbing just as Mary opened the door. Mrs. Pratt pulled the elder sister into the room.

"I've told Libby--she ought to have been told long ago--with you marryin' and goin' away and Ruth not havin' a bit of faculty and her bein' the one to take your place I think she was obliged to know it."

Mary came across the room with a rush, and took slim Elizabeth in loving arms.

"Go away, Cousin Hannah, please," she said. "You can sleep with Ruth and I'll stay with Elizabeth."

Mrs. Pratt, glad enough to be relieved from sight of the misery she had caused, hurried away and the two sisters were alone together. Mary knew very little of what Cousin Hannah had seen fit to reveal, a child herself at the time, she had but vague remembrances of it, and indeed Elizabeth asked no questions--she only needed to be comforted, and this Mary did as best she could.

The next day but one was the wedding day, Mr. Bellamy was expected in the morning and they would probably have no other chance for private talk, but Mary urged Elizabeth to go to their mother for comfort when the wedding was over, and some time late in the night they both fell asleep.

In the days that followed the wedding, when everything was strange, and they were settling slowly back into the usual routine Elizabeth found no opportunity to speak with her mother of that trouble which had come now to haunt every waking hour, and even pursued her into dreams.

Mary and her euphoniously named Mr. Bellamy had gone on their way to Oklahoma, where the bridegroom owned a ranch. Cousin Hannah Pratt, having helped with the wedding sewing and the packing, had gone back to Emerald and her own overflowing boarding-house. Mrs. Spooner, the three girls, and old Jonah were left alone, face to face with the problem of getting along.

Everything had settled into the usual routine at the Silver Spur; Mrs. Spooner, rather weak from her neuralgia and the strain of the wedding, sat on the front porch in a big chair which Elizabeth had endeavored to make comfortable with rugs and pillows.

"Are you perfectly sure I can't do anything else for you, Mother?" she asked anxiously. "Mary always waited on you so beautifully, while--it seems to me I've never done one little thing for you, when you've done so much for me!"

A big tear slipped from the long lashes and splashed on Mrs. Spooner's little hand, fluttering among the cushions. In a minute the mother-arms had pulled the girl's head down to the mother-breast, the thin fingers patting the blond braids and the mother-voice crooning comfort into the crumpled little ear buried upon the maternal shoulder.

"Don't cry, daughter, Mother loves you just the same! Haven't you been our own since you were, O, such a wee baby! It was cruel of Cousin Hannah to tell you, but we won't let it make one bit of difference. You're ours and we are yours. A thing like that can't matter to people who love each other as we do."

"It--it doesn't matter, Mother," gasped Elizabeth, as she mopped her reddened eyes, "if I can just take Mary's place to you. I am going to try, my very level best."

"Then you'll be sure to succeed," said her mother, confidently. "You always succeed in everything you undertake--hadn't you noticed that, dear? Now, really, I'm just as comfortable as hands can make me, so you run on down to the corral and help Ruth and the Babe with the ponies. You ride with them to Emerald, and get the mail--it'll do you good. And be sure you bring me a letter from father."

Cheered by her mother's words, Elizabeth gave one more pat and pull to the pillows, kissed her, and ran down to the corral, where the girls were roping the ponies. She and Ruth could each rope a little, missing about three out of five throws, but the Babe usually flourished so reckless a loop that she entangled herself, and had to be helped out; in spite of which old Jonah Bean insisted that she was the only one who showed any signs of learning the art.

Poor Elizabeth! Her castle of dreams had fallen, leaving her wide awake to the fact that she was no princess of romance but the humble offspring of miserable movers, such as had always been the objects of her shuddering contempt. Even Cousin Hannah's heart was touched with pity, and she tried with clumsy but hearty kindness to make amends for the grief she had caused by her disclosure. Nothing had been said to Ruth and the Babe, of course--they still believed her to be their born sister. However, deep down in her heart, Elizabeth was walking in the Valley of Humiliation amid the dust and ashes of dead hopes; and, as most people know, when one enters the Valley it is very, very hard to find the way out again!

Mrs. Spooner, watching the girls ride down the road, sighed softly. "Poor child," she murmured pityingly, "I can hardly forgive Cousin Hannah. But in the end it may prove the best thing. I'm afraid we were spoiling her. This may bring out the fine nature that I know she possesses."

Texas is a land of far horizons; Mrs. Spooner could see all the vast, brown-green circling plain until it lost itself in the hazy distance.

Away up the trail that led to her brother's distant ranch, twenty miles further from Emerald, she noticed a moving cloud of dust which resolved itself into an oscillating speck--two--a man on a pony, with a led horse.

For some reason which she could not have explained, Mrs. Spooner felt that the approaching