"Why, here you are, Helen Morrell! Why don't I ever see you when I come here?" cried the caller, shaking Helen by both hands and smiling upon her heartily from her superior height. "When are your cousins going to bring you to call upon me?"

Helen might have replied, truthfully, "Never;" but she only shook her head and smilingly declared: "I hope to see you again soon, Miss Van Ramsden."

"Well, I guess you must!" cried the caller. "I want to hear some more of your experiences," and she went on to meet the scowling Belle at the door of the reception parlor.

Later her eldest cousin said to the Western girl:

"In going up and down to your room, Miss, I want you to remember that there is a back stairway. Use the servants' stairs, if you please!"

Helen made no reply. She wasn't breaking much of the ice between her and Belle Starkweather, that was sure. And to add to Belle's dislike for her cousin, there was another happening in which Miss Van Ramsden was concerned, soon after this.

Hortense was still abed, for the weather remained unpleasant--and there really was nothing else for the languid cousin to do. Miss Van Ramsden found Belle out, and she went upstairs to say "how-do" to the invalid.

Helen was in the room making the spoiled girl more comfortable, and Miss Van Ramsden drew the younger girl out into the hall when she left.

"I really have come to see _you_, child," she said to Helen, frankly. "I was telling papa about you and he said he would dearly love to meet Prince Morrell's daughter. Papa went to college with your father, my dear."

Helen was glad of this, and yet she flushed a little. She was quite frank, however: "Does--does your father know about poor dad's trouble?" she whispered.

"He does. And he always believed Mr. Morrell not guilty. Father was one of the firm's creditors, and he has always wished your father had come to him instead of leaving the city so long ago."

"Then he's been paid?" cried Helen, eagerly.

"Certainly. It is a secret, I believe--father warned me not to speak of it unless you did; but everybody was paid by your father after a time. _That_ did not look as though he were dishonest. His partner took advantage of the bankruptcy courts."

"Of--of course your father has no idea who _was_ guilty?" whispered Helen, anxiously.

"None at all," replied Miss Van Ramsden. "It was a mystery then and remains so to this day. That bookkeeper was a peculiar man, but had a good record; and it seems that he left the city before the checks were cashed.

Or, so the evidence seemed to prove.

"Now, don't cry, my dear! Come! I wish we could help you clear up that old trouble. But many of your father's old friends--like papa--never believed Prince Morrell guilty."

Helen was crying by this time. The kindness of this older girl broke down her self-possession. They heard somebody coming up the stairs, and Miss Van Ramsden said, quickly:

"Take me to your room, dear. We can talk there."

Helen never thought that she might be giving the Starkweather family deadly offence by doing this. She led Miss Van Ramsden immediately to the rear of the house and up the back stairway to the attic floor. The caller looked somewhat amazed when Helen ushered her into the room.

"Well, they could not have put you much nearer the sky; could they?" she said, laughing, yet eyeing Helen askance.

"Oh, I don't mind it up here," returned Helen, truthfully enough. "And I have some company on this floor."

"Ahem! The maids, I suppose?" said May Van Ramsden.

"No, no," Helen a.s.sured her, eagerly. "The dearest little old lady you ever saw."

Then she stopped and looked at her caller in some distress. For the moment she had forgotten that she was probably on the way to reveal the Starkweather family skeleton!

"A little old lady? Who can _that_ be?" cried the caller. "You interest me."

"I--I--Well, it is an old lady who was once nurse in the family and I believe Uncle Starkweather cares for her----"

"It's never Nurse Boyle?" cried Miss Van Ramsden, suddenly starting up.

"Why! I remember about her. But somehow, I thought she had died years ago.

Why, as a child I used to visit her at the house, and she used to like to have me come to see her. That was before your cousins lived here, Helen.

Then I went to Europe for several years and when we returned the house had all been done over, your uncle's family was here, and I think--I am not sure--somebody told me dear old Mary Boyle was dead."

"No," observed Helen, thoughtfully. "She is not dead. She is only forgotten."

Miss Van Ramsden looked at the Western girl for some moments in silence.

She seemed to understand the whole matter without a word of further explanation.

"Would you mind letting me see Mary Boyle while I am here?" she asked, gravely. "She was a very lovely old soul, and all the families hereabout--I have heard my mother often say--quite envied the Starkweathers their possession of such a treasure."

"Certainly we can go in and see her," declared Helen, throwing all discretion to the winds. "I was going to read to her this afternoon, anyway. Come along!"

She led the caller through the hall to Mary Boyle's little suite of rooms.

To herself Helen said:

"Let the wild winds of disaster blow! Whew! If the family hears of this I don't know but they will want to have me arrested--or worse! But what can I do? And then--Mary Boyle deserves better treatment at their hands."

CHAPTER XXII

IN THE SADDLE

The little old lady "tidied" her own room. She hopped about like a bird with the aid of the ebony crutch, and Helen and Miss Van Ramsden heard the "step--put" of her movements when they entered the first room.

"Come in, deary!" cried the dear old soul. "I was expecting you. Ah, whom have we here? Good-day to you, ma'am!"

"Nurse Boyle! don't you remember me?" cried the visitor, going immediately to the old lady and kissing her on both cheeks.

"Bless us, now! How would I know ye?" cried the old woman. "Is it me old eyes I have set on ye for many a long year now?"

"And I blame myself for it, Nurse," cried May Van Ramsden. "Don't you remember little May--the Van Ramsdens' May--who used to come to see you so often when she was about so-o high?" cried the girl, measuring the height of a five or six-year-old.

"A neighbor's baby _did_ come to see Old Mary now and then," cried the nurse. "But you're never May?"

"I am, Nurse."

"And growed so tall and handsome? Well, well, well! It does bate all, so it does. Everybody grows up but Mary Boyle; don't they?" and the old woman cackled out a sweet, high laugh, and sat down to "visit" with her callers.

The two girls had a very charming time with Mary Boyle. And May Van Ramsden promised to come again. When they left the old lady she said, earnestly, to Helen:

"And there are others that will be glad to come and see Nurse Boyle. When she was well and strong--before she had to use that crutch--she often appeared at our houses when there was trouble--serious trouble--especially with the babies or little children. And what Mary Boyle did not know about pulling young ones out of the mires of illness, wasn't worth knowing. Why, I know a dozen boys and girls whose lives were probably saved by her. They shall be reminded of her existence. And--it shall be due to you, Little Cinderella!"

Helen smiled deprecatingly. "It will be due to your own kind heart, Miss Van Ramsden," she returned. "I see that everybody in the city is not so busy with their own affairs that they cannot think of other people."