Mrs. Legrange sadly shook her head.

“No, Theodore:  I never wished to do that.  She never could be any thing like her to me, and it would seem like giving away her place.  I had rather wait.”

“I am sorry, ma’am; for I saw a little girl, where I have been, that I was going to speak of.”

“Was she a pretty child?”

“Very pretty, and looked like”—­

“Theodore, don’t say that, because I shall think either you have forgotten or never learned her face.  No child ever looked like her,” said the mother positively.

“This little girl was very pretty though,” persisted Teddy.

“How did she look?”

“She had great blue eyes (if you’ll excuse, me, ma’am), just like yours, with long brown eyelashes, and a great deal of bright hair, not just brown, nor yet just golden, but between the two; and a little mouth very much curved; and pretty teeth; and a delicate color; and little hands with pretty finger-nails.”

“Theodore!”

Teddy, for the first time in his description, dared to raise his eyes, but dropped them again.  He could not meet the anguish in those other eyes so earnestly fixed upon him.

“She was the adopted child of the people I visited in Iowa,” faltered he.

“Theodore!” said Mrs. Legrange again; and then, in a breathless fluttering voice,—­

“Do not trifle with me; do not try to prepare my mind; and, oh!  For God’s sake, if it is a false hope, say so this instant!  Is she found?”

“I think it may be so, dear Mrs. Legrange!”

“No, but it is so! you know it!  I see it in your eyes, I hear it in your voice!  You cannot hide it, you cannot deceive me!  O my God! my God!-to thee the first praise, the first thanks!”

She fell upon her knees, her face upraised to heaven; and never mortal artist drew such a picture of ecstatic praise.  And though in after-years Theodore Ginniss wandered through the galleries where the world conserves her rarest gems of art, never did he find Madonna or Magdalen or saint to compare with the one picture his memory treasured as the perfection of earthly loveliness, made radiant with the purest heavenly bliss.

“Now come!” exclaimed the mother, springing to her feet, and rapidly leading the way along the narrow path.  “You shall tell me all as we go.”

And the young man found it hard work to keep pace with the delicate woman, as she flew rather than walked towards her child.

“If you will wait here in your own room, I will bring her to you,” said Teddy, as he and Mrs. Legrange approached the hotel again.

“Bring her!  Where is she now? asked the mother, looking at him in dismay.

“I left them at the other hotel, thinking, if I brought her directly here, we might meet you before you were told,” explained Teddy.

“Who is with her?”

“Dora Darling, the young lady who adopted her,—­the one I told you of as living in Iowa.”