her a big dose
of sleeping powder and put another in the table drawer for me to mix for
her towards morning. She was helpless to move, we thought, but all the
same she must have got out of bed when my back was turned and taken
the powder dry on her tongue, for it was gone when I looked for it. It
didn't hasten things much and I don't blame her. If ever there was a
wild, reckless creature it was Hetty Rodman, but I, who am just the
opposite, would have done the same if I'd been her.'

"She hurriedly gave me a cup of coffee, and, putting a coat and a cap
on the boy, literally pushed me out of the house. 'I've got to report
things to the doctor,' she said, 'and you're better out of the way. Go
down that side street to the station and mind you say the boy belonged
to your sister who died and left him to you. You're a Cochranite, ain't
you? So was Hetty, and they're all sisters, so you'll be telling no
lies. Good-bye, Rodman, be a good boy and don't be any trouble to the
lady.'

"How I found the station I do not know, nor how I made the journey, nor
where I took the stage-coach. The snow began to fall and by noon there
was a drifting storm. I could not remember where I was going, nor
who the boy was, for just as the snow was whirling outside, so it was
whirling in my brain."

"Mother, I can hardly bear to hear any more; it is too terrible!" cried
Ivory, rising from his chair and pacing the floor.

"I can recall nothing of any account till I awoke in my own bed weeks
afterwards. The strange little boy was there, but Mrs. Day and Dr. Perry
told me what I must have told them--that he was the child of my dead
sister. Those were the last words uttered by the woman in Brentville;
I carried them straight through my illness and brought them out on the
other side more firmly intrenched than ever."

"If only the truth had come back to you sooner!" sighed Ivory, coming
back to her bedside. "I could have helped you to bear it all these
years. Sorrow is so much lighter when you can share it with some one
else. And the girl who died was called Hetty Rodman, then, and she
simply gave the child her last name?"

"Yes, poor suffering creature. I feel no anger against her now; it
has burned itself all away. Nor do I feel any bitterness against your
father. I forgot all this miserable story for so long, loving and
watching for him all the time, that it is as if it did not belong to
my own life, but had to do with some unhappy stranger.