Usually her hard eyes were coldly unsmiling. Now they
smiled--terribly. Usually her thin cheeks were almost dead white in
their pallor. Now they were flushed and hectic with a suggestion of
the inward fire that lit her eyes. The harsh mouth was irrevocably
set, till nose and chin looked as though they soon must meet, while
the hideous dark rings showed up the cruel glare of her eyes, which
shone diabolically.

Joan stood some paces away. She was looking down aghast at the
crouching figure, and her eyes were horrified. This was the first she
had seen of her relative since her return that morning. The old woman
had shut herself up in her bedroom, refusing to speak, or to eat, all
day. But now she had emerged from her seclusion, and Joan had been
forced to listen to the story of her journey.

It was a painful story, and still more painfully told. It was full of
a cruel enjoyment such as never in her life Joan had believed this
woman capable of. Her eccentricities were many, her nervous tendencies
strange and often weird, but never had such a side of her character as
she now presented been allowed to rise to the surface.

At first Joan wondered as she listened. She wondered at the fierce
purpose which underlaid this weakly body. But with each passing
moment, with each fresh detail of her motives and methods, her wonder
deepened to a rapidly growing conviction which filled her with horror
and repulsion. She told herself that the woman was no longer sane. At
last she had fallen a victim to her racked and broken nerves, as the
doctors had prophesied. To them, and to the everlasting brooding upon
her disappointments and injuries for all these long years.

This she felt, and yet the feeling conveyed no real conviction to her
mind. All she knew was that loathing and repulsion stirred her, until
the thought revolted her that she was breathing the same air as one
who could be capable of such vicious cruelty. But she struggled to
stifle all outward sign. And though she was only partly successful she
contrived to keep her words calm, even if her eyes, those windows of
her simple girl's soul, would not submit to such control.

"I'm over fifty now, girl," Mercy finished up, in a low suppressed
tone, husky with feeling, yet thrilling with a cruel triumph. "Over
fifty, and, for the last twenty and more years of it, I have waited
for this moment. I have waited with a patience you can never
understand because you have never been ma