“What locket?” he said, with surprise.

“The locket the lady dropped into my lap—­’From Natalie to Natalushka.’”

“I declare to you, little daughter, I never heard of it.”

The girl looked bewildered.

“Ah, how stupid I am!” she exclaimed.  “I could not understand.  But if they always called her Natalie, and me Natalushka—­”

She paused for a moment to collect her thoughts.

“Signor Calabressa, what does it mean?” she said, almost wildly.  “If one sends me a locket—­’From Natalie to Natalushka’—­was it my mother’s?  Did she intend it for me?  Did she leave it for me with some one, long ago?  How could it come into the hands of a stranger?”

Calabressa himself seemed rather bewildered—­almost alarmed.

“My little daughter, you have no doubt guessed right,” he said, soothingly.  “Your mother may have meant it for you—­and—­and perhaps it was lost—­and just recovered—­”

“Signor Calabressa,” said she—­and he could have fancied it was her mother who was speaking in that low, earnest, almost sad voice—­“you said you would do me an act of friendship if I asked you.  I cannot ask my father; he seems too grieved to speak of my mother at any time; but do you think you could find out who the lady was who brought that locket to me?  That would be kind of you, if you could do that.”

CHAPTER XVIII.

HER ANSWER.

Humphreys, the delegate from the North, and O’Halloran, the Irish reporter, had been invited by George Brand to dine with him on this evening—­Humphreys having to start for Wolverhampton next day—­and the three were just sitting down when Lord Evelyn called in, uninvited, and asked if he might have a plate placed for him.  Humphreys was anxious that their host should set out with him for the North in the morning; but Brand would not promise.  He was obviously thinking of other things.  He was at once restless, preoccupied, and silent.

“I hope, my lord, you have come to put our friend here in better spirits,” said Humphreys, blushing a little as he ventured to call one of the Brands of Darlington his friend.

“What is the matter?”

At this moment Waters appeared at the door with a letter in his hand.  Brand instantly rose, went forward to him and took the letter, and retired into an adjoining room.  Without looking, he know from whom it had come.

His hand was shaking as he opened the envelope; but the words that met his eyes were calm.

“My dear friend,—­Your letter has given me joy and pain.  Joy that you still adhere to your noble resolve; that you have found gladness in your life; that you will work on to the end, whatever the fruit of the work may be.  But this other thought of yours—­that only distresses me; it clouds the future with uncertainty and doubt, where there should only be clear faith.  My dear friend,