gan to cry.

"Poor Mrs. Newton's grief has been very trying," he said, gently, and
with a certain serenity of smile he had, and he added, as if he thought
it well to lure Miss Northwick from the minor affliction that we feel
for others' sorrows to the sorrow itself, "It has been a terrible blow
to her--so sudden, and her only child."

"Oh, it isn't that," said Adeline, frankly. "Have--have you seen
the--paper this morning?"

"It came," said the clergyman. "But in view of the duty before me, I
thought I wouldn't read it. Is there anything particular in it?"

"No, nothing. Only--only--" Adeline had not been able to separate
herself from the dreadful thing, and she took it out of the carriage
pocket. "There has been an accident on the railroad," she began firmly,
but she broke down in the effort to go on. "And I wanted to have you
see--see--" She stopped, and handed him the paper.

He took it and ran over the account of the accident, and came at her
trouble with an instant intelligence that was in itself a sort of
reassurance. "But had you any reason to suppose your father was on the
train?"

"No," she said from the strength he gave her. "That is the strange part
about it. He went up to the Mills, yesterday morning, and he couldn't
have been on the train at all. Only the name--"

"It isn't quite the name," said Wade, with a gentle moderation, as if he
would not willingly make too much of the difference, and felt truth to
be too sacred to be tampered with even while it had merely the form of
possibility.

"No," said Adeline, eager to be comforted, "and I'm sure he's at the
Mills. Elbridge has sent a dispatch to find out if he's there, but there
must be something the matter with the telegraph. We hadn't heard before
the funeral; or, at least, he didn't bring the word; and I hated to keep
round after him when--"

"He probably hadn't heard," said the clergyman, soothingly, "and no news
is good news, you know. But hadn't we better drive round by the station,
and find out whether any answer has been--"

"O, no! I couldn't do that!" said Adeline, nervously. "They will
telephone the answer up to Elbridge. But come home with me, if you
haven't something to do, and stay with us till we--"

"Oh, very willingly." On the way the young clergyman talked of the
accident, guessing that her hysterical conjectures had heightened the
horror, and that he should make it less dreadful by exploring its facts
with her. He did not dec