in the
carriage; there were no more balls or parties; "extreme quiet and
repose" seemed to be the keynote. Mamma was always "resting."

"She cannot want rest," I exclaimed, "when she does nothing to tire her!
Oh, let me go to her!" for some foolish person had started a theory that
I tired her. I who worshiped her, who would have kept silence for a year
rather than have disturbed her for one moment! I appealed to Sir Roland,
and he consulted her; the result was that I was permitted to steal into
her boudoir, and, to my childish mind, it seemed that during those days
my mother's heart and mine grew together.

CHAPTER III.

It was a quiet Christmas at Tayne Abbey; we had no visitors, for my
mother required the greatest care; but she did not forget one person in
the house, or one on the estate. Sir Roland laughed when he saw the
preparations--the beef, the blankets, the clothing of all kinds, the
innumerable presents, for she had remembered every one's wants and
needs. Sir Roland laughed.

"My dearest Beatrice," he said; "this will cost far more than a houseful
of guests."

"Never mind the cost," she said; "it will bring down a blessing on us."

A quiet, beautiful Christmas. My father was in the highest of spirits,
and would have the house decorated with holly and mistletoe. He went out
to a few parties, but he was always unwilling to leave my mother, though
she wished him to go; then, when we were quite alone, the wind wailing,
the snow falling and beating up against the windows, she would ask me to
read to her the beautiful gospel story of the star in the East and the
child born in the stable because there was no room for Him in the inn. I
read it to her over and over again; then we used to talk about it. She
loved to picture the streets of Bethlehem, the star in the East, the
herald angels, the shepherds who came from over the hills.

She was never tired, and I wondered why that story, more than any other,
interested her so greatly.

I knew afterward.

It was February; the snowdrops were peeping above the ground; the yellow
and purple crocuses appeared; in the clear, cold air there was a faint
perfume of violets, and the terrible sorrow of our lives began.

I had gone to bed very happy one night, for my fair young mother had
been most loving to me. She had been lying on the sofa in her boudoir
all day; her luncheon and dinner had been carried to her, and, as a
great privilege, I had been permitted to