It was only natural that Hermia's thoughts, since "Uncle John" had revealed to her the story of her adoption, should revert times without number to the mystery which enshrouded her birth and early years, challenging it first from one point of view and then from another, but only to give it up at last baffled and disheartened, and still, to all seeming, no nearer than before to finding the hidden key. More and more the possibility that she might still have a mother living became a dominant factor in her thoughts. Might there not have been a score of different reasons, she asked herself, why this mother should have been compelled to put her child out among strangers? And might not the same or other reasons still have force enough to keep her from acknowledging her daughter, or even allowing the fact of her own existence to become known? The more Hermia allowed her mind to dwell on the image thus conjured up the more clearly did it--unconsciously to the girl herself--assume by degrees an objective existence in her thoughts, till at length it needed but little to induce her to persuade herself that this mysterious parent was a being as real and tangible as any of those she saw around her. It was strange, she sometimes thought, that never had she yearned so much for a mother's love as now, when that other love, so sweet and yet so widely different, had taken her heart captive and held it beyond all power of ransom.

Something of this Hermia confided to Clement in their many walks and talks together--something, but not all, for in a maiden's heart there are sacred chambers, the threshold of which, not even to her lover, is it given to cross. But much of what she did not tell Clement, love's fine intuition enabled him to divine. For one thing, he could see that Hermia, without attaching paramount importance to the interdiction which had been laid upon her, could not help secretly chafing under it; as also that, in her own despite, the longing to unmask the secret of her birth was becoming more importunate day by day. Thus it fell out that, after a little while, Clement began to formulate a certain scheme in his mind, and when once he saw his way clear, proceeded with characteristic energy to arrange the preliminary steps for carrying it out.

On a certain spring evening, when our two young people were alone together, Clem said abruptly, and apropos to nothing which had gone before, "I don't think, dearest, that if you were to try till to-morrow you could guess what I am going to do next week."

"In that case it would be foolish of me to try. But, of course, you will experience a little sense of injury if, after this preliminary flourish on your part, I omit to ask you what it is that you purpose doing."

"On Tuesday next I shall leave home for a fortnight's holiday."

"Oh!" a little dubiously. "I was not aware that you are out of health--you don't look it--and if you are fagged or worried with overwork, you have kept your secret very carefully."

Clem tugged at his moustache and broke into a laugh.

"I was never better in my life than at this moment; and as for overwork, if I had fifty more patients on my hands than I have, you would not hear a murmur of complaint."

"But what about such patients as you have on your hands? Are you going to give them a chance of recovering while you are away?"

"Not likely; that would never do. A friend of mine, Vallance by name, who happens just now to be on the lookout for a practice of his own, has offered to come and physic them during my absence."

"Well, I hope you will have fine weather and enjoy yourself, although the majority of people, who, of course, don't know better, generally defer their holidays till July or August."

"I am quite aware that you are dying to ask me my reasons for going away at this time of year, only your pride won't let you do so."

"The self-conceit of some people is truly amazing. I curious to know your reasons! What next, pray?"

"In any case, I'll take pity on you and tell you. Know, then, dearest, that the first aim and object which I have set before me is to hunt up that estimable but unaccountable person, Mr. Hodgson."

"To hunt up Mr. Hodgson?" gasped Hermia. "But for what purpose? What will you gain by doing that?"

"Whether I shall gain anything or nothing time alone can tell. In any case, when I have found him, I intend--metaphorically speaking--to grip him by the throat, and bid him stand and deliver. In other words, I mean to see what a personal interview will do towards wresting from him that secret--or, if not the secret itself, some clue to it, however faint--which I know you, my dear one, are so anxiously longing to fathom."

Hermia did not speak, but her eyes flushed with tears.

"It is quite possible that the old boy, when I tell him who I am, may refuse point-blank to discuss the matter with me. In that event I can't say what I shall do, or what course may seem best for me to follow. But the first thing to do is to find Mr. H. and tackle him."

"My poor boy!" replied Hermia, with a pitying smile. "You seem to have forgotten one important fact, which is, that none of us, not even Uncle John himself, is acquainted with Mr. Hodgson's address, or has the remotest notion where to find him. Uncle's letter in reply to his was simply addressed to the care of a certain firm of solicitors in London. Of course, it is open to you to go to the firm in question, and ask them to oblige you with Mr. Hodgson's address; but is it not rather doubtful whether they would comply with your request?"

"Very doubtful, indeed," responded Clem, dryly. "So much so, that I don't think I shall trouble myself to go near them. I've a better plan than that for arriving at what I want to know."

Speaking thus he unbuttoned his coat, and from the breast-pocket ............