What a slender, diminutive creature she was--how fixedly pale, paler still in contrast with her black hair and great, melancholy dark eyes.

She never looked up--she went on, stitch, stitch, like any machine, until Kate spoke, suddenly: "Agnes!" The dark eyes lifted inquiringly.
"How old are you ?" "Twenty-two." "You don't look it.

Are your parents living ?" "No; dead these many years." "Have you brothers or sisters ?" "No, I never had." "But you have other relatives--uncles, aunts, cousins ?" "No, Miss Danton--none that I have ever seen." "What an isolated little thing you are! Have you lived in Montreal all your life ?" "Oh, no! I have only been in Montreal a few months.

I was born and brought up in New York." "In New York!" repeated Kate, surprised.

And then there was a pause.
When had Doctor Danton been in New York?
For the last four years he had been in Germany; from Germany he had come direct to Canada, so Grace had told her; where, then, had he known this New York girl?
"Why did you come to Montreal ?" asked Kate.
There was a nervous contraction around the girl's mouth, and something seemed to fade out of her face--not color, for she had none--but it darkened with something like sudden anguish.
"I had a friend," she said hastily, "a friend I lost; I heard I might find that--that friend in Montreal, and so--" Her voice died away, and she put up one trembling hand to shade her face.