Mrs. Allison partially released Mabel from her embrace, though she
still held her hand, and allowed Grace to gently push her back
toward her chair.

"I don't quite understand you, my dear," she said brokenly. "But I
am sure that I have found my own dear little child."

"And I am sure of it, too," replied Grace. "In fact, we have
suspected it since the day we first saw you at the station. We
noticed the marked resemblance between you and Mabel, and when you
told us your name was Allison we all felt that you might be
Mabel's mother. Do you feel strong enough to hear our story and to
tell us yours?"

"Tell me quickly," exclaimed Mrs. Allison eagerly, recovering in a
measure from her violent agitation. "I must know the truth. It
seems incredible that I should find my lost baby girl alive and in
good hands. I am surely dreaming. It cannot be true. Yet she has
the same sweet, serious expression in her brown eyes that she had
in babyhood. Even her middle name, Isabel, that her father
insisted upon giving her because it is mine!"

Anne, dreading another outbreak, gently interposed. "Try and be
calm, Mrs. Allison, while we tell you about Mabel."

Then Anne began with the winning of the freshman prize by Mabel at
the close of her freshman year, and the interest she had aroused
in the girl chums, and followed with the story of her adoption by
the Phi Sigma Tau.