she began.

"Oh," I hastened to say, "you think I would be more of a hindrance to
you than a help; that I would do the work, perhaps, but in my own way
rather than in yours. Well, that would doubtless have been true of me a
month since, but I have learned a great deal in the last few weeks,--you
will not ask me how,--and now I stand ready to do your work in your way,
and to take a great deal of pleasure in it too."

"Ah, Miss Butterworth," she exclaimed, with a burst of genuine feeling
which I would not have lost for the world, "I always knew that you had a
kind heart; and I am going to accept your offer in the same spirit in
which it is made."

So that was settled, and with it the possibility of my spending another
night in this house.

At ten o'clock I stole away from the library and the delightful company
of Mr. Stone, who had insisted upon sharing my labors, and went up to
Miss Oliver's room. I met the nurse at the door.

"You want to see her," said she. "She's asleep, but does not rest very
easily. I don't think I ever saw so pitiful a case. She moans
continually, but not with physical pain. Yet she seems to have courage
too; for now and then she starts up with a loud cry. Listen."

I did so, and this is what I heard:

"I do not want to live; doctor, I do not want to live; why do you try to
make me better?"

"That is what she is saying all the time. Sad, isn't it?"

I acknowledged it to be so, but at the same time wondered if the girl
were not right in wishing for death as a relief from her troubles.

Early the next morning I inquired at her door again. Miss Oliver was
better. Her fever had left her, and she wore a more natural look than at
any time since I had seen her. But it was not an untroubled one, and it
was with difficulty I met her eyes when she asked if they were coming
for her that day, and if she could see Miss Althorpe before she left. As
she was not yet able to leave her bed I could easily answer her first
question, but I knew too little of Mr. Gryce's intentions to be able to
reply to the second. But I was easy with this suffering woman, very
easy, more easy than I ever supposed I could be with any one so
intimately associated with crime.

She seemed to accept my explanations as readily as she already had my
presence, and I was struck again with surprise as I considered that my
name had never aroused in her the least emotion.

"Miss Althorpe has been so good to me I should like to than