"Not entirely, Paul. But you may remember, if the incident has not banished the fact from your mind, that you are at present conducting me, at my request, to Something-or-other Cottage, which I had failed to find unassisted."
"Quite so. We are almost there. Yonder is Babylon Lane, which I understand is part of my legacy. Dovelands Cottage, I believe, is situated about half-way along it."
"Babylon Lane," mused Don. "Why so named?"
"That I cannot tell you. The name of Babylon invariably conjures up strange pictures of pagan feasts, don't you find? The mere sound of the word is sufficient to transport us to the great temple of Ishtar, and to dazzle our imagination with processions of flower-crowned priestesses. Heaven alone knows by what odd freak this peaceful lane was named after the city of Semiramis. But you were speaking of a coincidence."
"Yes, it is the mother of the nymph, Flamby, that I am going to visit; the Widow Duveen."
"Then this girl with the siren hair is she of whom you spoke?"
"Evidently none other. I told you, Paul, that I bore a message from her father, given to me under pledge of secrecy as he lay dying, to her mother. Paul, the man's life was a romance—a tragic romance. I cannot divulge his secrets, but his name was not Duveen; he was a cadet of one of the oldest families in Ireland."
"You interest me intensely. He seems to have been a wild fellow."
"Wild, indeed; and drink was his ruin. But he was a man, and by birth a gentleman. I am anxious to meet his widow."
"Of course, she knows of his death?"