"Aunt Minerva, where _did_ you get yours?" breathed Marcia, at last.
"Why, that's easily explained," answered Miss Brett. "Your father brought it to me about ten or twelve years ago, after one of his voyages. He said that a Chinese sailor in Hong-Kong had offered to sell it to him for a small sum, and seeing it was a rather unique little trinket, he bought it and brought it home to me. I never wear such things, however. Jewelry never did appeal to me, and bracelets, particularly, always seemed a nuisance. So I put it away intending to give it to you some day, Marcia. And after a while I actually forgot all about it--till to-night!"
Janet sat up very straight. "There's just one thing I'd give my head to know--this minute! _Where_ did Cecily get _her_ bracelet?"
"Well, that you can easily find out--but I'm afraid you'll have to wait till to-morrow morning!" laughed Marcia.
"There's something very strange about this," marveled Miss Minerva, turning the two trinkets over and over. "Actually, I can hardly tell now which is mine and which hers, except that mine is a little more tarnished from having been laid away. Your father said, when he gave me mine, that he'd never seen anything like it in any of those foreign jewelry-shops and that was why he'd been specially attracted to it."
"Aunty," said Marcia, suddenly, "where do you suppose that sailor got it?"
"Your father said," replied Miss Minerva, "that he'd probably stolen it, or somebody else had. It may have passed through dozens of hands after it was taken from the original owner. You never can tell about such things in the East, and it's useless to inquire."
Again they all stared hard at the two silver trinkets, lying side by side on the table.
"And these two bracelets once belonged to the same person," murmured Marcia, at last; "perhaps to some one connected with Cecily. And to think they should have drifted halfway around the world to find themselves side by side again in busy, practical New York!"
Next morning Marcia and Janet sallied forth to make their promised visit to Cecily. They were armed with a box of quinine pills, two glasses of currant jelly, a new magazine, Marcia's violin in its case, and, last, but not least, the two filigree bracelets. And they were literally bursting with news and excitement.