d never seen it before,
the face which, now shining with maternal love, seemed beautiful as an
angel's. It became to her like an angel's evermore.

How often, in our human fate, does the very Hand that taketh, give!

CHAPTER IX.

Mrs. Rothesay, touched by an impulse of regretful tenderness, showed
all due respect to the memory of the faithful woman who had nursed with
such devotion her husband and her child. For a whole long week Olive
wandered about the shut-up house, the formal solemnities of death, now
known for the first time, falling heavily on her young heart. Alas!
that there was no one to lift it beyond the terrors of the grave to the
sublime mysteries of immortality.

But the child knew none of these, and therefore she crept, awe-struck,
about the silent house, and when night fell, dared not even to pass near
the chamber--once her own and Elspie's--now Death's. She saw the other
members of the household enter there with solemn faces, and pass out,
carefully locking the door. What must there be within? Something on
which she dared not think, and which nothing could induce her to behold.
At times she forgot her sorrow; and, still keeping close to her mother's
side, amused herself with her usual childish games, piecing disjointed
maps, or drawing on a slate; but all was done with a quietness sadder
than even tears.

The evening before the funeral, Mrs. Rothesay went to look for the last
time on the remains of her faithful old servant. She tried to persuade
little Olive to go with her; the child accompanied her to the door, and
then, weeping violently, fled back and hid herself in another chamber.
From thence she heard her mother come away--also weeping, for the feeble
nature of Sybilla Rothesay had lost none of its tender-hearted softness.
Olive listened to the footsteps gliding downstairs, and there was
silence. Then the passionate affection which she had felt for her old
nurse rose up, driving away all childish fear, and strengthening her
into a resolution which until then she had not dared to form. To-morrow
they would take away Elspie--_for ever_. On earth she would never again
see the face which had been so beloved. Could she let Elspie go without
one look, only one? She determined to enter the awful room now, and
alone.

It was about seven in the evening, still daylight, though in the
darkened house dimmer than without. Olive drew the blind aside, took one
long gaze into the cheerful sunset land