"Mr. Wilton will be here soon; he is getting the carriage, to take your
sister home."

"I will go and help him, if you don't mind being left"; and he looked
inquiringly.

"There's no danger. I shall not fall asleep," I said.

"She's harmless now, poor child! If we can only get her back safely!"
And with these words he left me again.

Sophie came up soon, quite fearless now. She brought a variety of
comforting things, among them a pillow. Miss Axtell was too much
exhausted to open her eyes, or speak. I thought two or three times that
she had ceased to breathe. What if she should die here? They came. She
was lifted up, and borne down to the carriage, that waited outside the
graveyard. Helpless ones are carried in often: never before (it might
be) had one been taken thence. And still the village-people seemed to be
buried in rest.

Sophie and I walked on, whilst slowly the carriage proceeded to the
gable-roofed, high-chimneyed house, that arose, well defined and clear,
in the early sunlight. Smoke was rising from the kitchen-fire. Sophie
and I went in, just as the carriage stopped. She waited to receive the
invalid, whilst I went up to see if the absence had been discovered. It
was but little more than an hour since Mr. Axtell and I had gone out.
Evidently there had been no visitors. The wood that had been put on the
fire before I left had gone down into glowing coals that looked warm and
inviting. I kneeled and stirred them to a brighter glow, and put on more
wood, my fingers very stiff the while. I drew back the curtains from the