She was sitting on the couch by the window, with her mother's old music-book--the keepsake which Mrs.
Vanstone had found in her husband's study on the day of her husband's death--spread open on her lap.

She looked up from it with such quiet sorrow, and pointed with such ready kindness to the vacant place at her side, that Miss Garth doubted for the moment whether Magdalen had spoken the truth.

"See," said Norah, simply, turning to the first leaf in the music-book--"my mother's name written in it, and some verses to my father on the next page.

We may keep this for ourselves, if we keep nothing else." She put her arm round Miss Garth's neck, and a faint tinge of color stole over her cheeks.

"I see anxious thoughts in your face," she whispered.