long, green valley, and then rolled rapidly up to the depot.

Little Willie had seemed unwell for a few days, but since his sister's
illness he had stayed by her almost constantly, gazing half-curiously,
half-timidly into her face, and asking if she was going to the home
where his mamma lived. She had told him that Margaret was coming, and
when the shrill whistle of the eastern train sounded through the room
he ran to the window, whither Lenora had preceded him, and there
together they watched for the coming of the omnibus. A sinister smile
curled the lips of Mrs. Hamilton who was present, and who, of course,
affected to feel interested.

At last Willie, clapping his hands, exclaimed, "There 'tis! They're
coming. That's Maggie's big trunk!" Then, noticing the glow which his
announcement called up to Carrie's cheek, he said, "She'll make you
well, Carrie, Maggie will. Oh, I'm so glad, and so is Leno."

Nearer and nearer came the omnibus, brighter and deeper grew the flush
on Carrie's face, while little Willie danced up and down with joy.

"It isn't coming here," said Mrs. Hamilton; "it has gone by," and
Carrie's feverish heat was succeeded by an icy chill.

"Haven't they come, Lenora?" she said.

Lenora shook her head, and Willie, running to his sister, wound his
arms around her neck, and for several minutes the two lone, motherless
children wept.

"If Maggie knew how my head ached she'd come," said Willie; but Carrie
thought not of _her_ aching head, nor of the faintness of death which
was fast coming on. One idea alone engrossed her. Her brother--how
would he be saved from the threatened evil, and her father's name from
dishonor?

At last Mrs. Hamilton left the room, and Carrie, speaking to Lenora
and one of the villagers who was present, asked if they, too, would
not leave her alone for a time with Willie. They complied with her
request, and then asking her brother to bring her pencil and paper,
she hurriedly wrote a few lines to her father telling him of what she
had heard, and entreating him, for her sake, and the sake of the
mother with whom she would be when those words met his eye, not to do
Walter so great a wrong. "I shall give this to Willie's care," she
wrote, in conclusion, "and he will keep it carefully until you come.
And now, I bid you a long farewell, my precious father--my noble
Mag--my darling Walter."

The note was finished, and calling Willie to her, she said, "I am
going to die. When Magg