“Yes,” said Tavia simply, and the next moment she had both arms around that beautiful neck.

The woman held the girl to her breast for a moment.  Tavia’s heart was beating wildly.

“My dear,” said Mrs. White, “I do hope you have enjoyed yourself,” and she kissed her again.  “But you must promise me not to paint with mullen leaves any more.  Sometimes such jokes lead to habits—­one looks pale you know when the blaze dies away.”

Tavia felt as if her blaze never would die away.  Why had she been so foolish?  She would have given anything now to rub those horrid, prickly leaves off forever.

“I never will paint—­” she stammered.

“I hope you will not, dear, you should be grateful for such coloring as you have.  But let me warn you in all kindness.  It is usually pretty girls who make such mistakes—­they want to be more and more attractive and so spoil it all.  Think right, and of pleasant things, and the glory of happiness will be all the cosmetic you will ever need,” and again she pressed her own white cheek to the burning face of the girl she still held in her arms.

Later, when Tavia was thinking it all over, she pondered seriously upon those words.  No one had ever spoken to her just that way before—­at home it was taken for granted she knew so much more than those around her, that such counsel as she needed was withheld.  Alas, how many girls lose valuable advice by appearing to be over-smart for their years!  And then the awakening is always doubly sad.  So it was with this mistake of Tavia’s, trivial enough, yet for her—­it appeared like a crime to have put those mullen leaves to her cheeks; to be thought vain; to have Mrs. White warn her about other girls!

It seemed a very short time indeed, from the arrival of the special message at the Cedars until the train was speeding back toward Dalton.  And the journey had lost all its novelty, for Dorothy and Tavia were so intent upon the possible happenings when they should reach home, that the wait, even on a flying train, seemed tiresome.

“Do you suppose,” ventured Tavia, as she laid her book down, after a number of unsuccessful efforts to become interested in the story, “they have captured that Anderson?”

“I am sure I cannot guess,” answered Dorothy, “but I feel certain it is about that affair that we are called home in such a hurry.  I wish I could soon keep the promise I made to poor Mr. Burlock.  I said I would some day find his daughter Nellie, and it does seem the detectives have been a long time in finding any tangible clew.  Father hired two of the best he could get to trace the child—­that was her mother who died, the one you told me of, you know.  I did not talk about it because father thought it was best to say nothing that might possibly give Anderson a hint that they were on his track.”

“And have they tracked him?” asked Tavia.

“Yes, they know he left Mr. Burlock in Rochester.  He cashed a check there that Mr. Burlock gave him for what the poor man thought would be a possible clew to little Nellie’s whereabouts, and to think that the disappointment killed the disheartened father!”