she lay down again, but could not get to sleep until long
after the whistle had blown for the midnight train that went through to
the city.

Next morning Ernestine did not come to breakfast, but it was nothing
unusual, so Kittie fixed a tempting waiter and took it up stairs.

In a few minutes she called "mama," in a frightened way, and Mrs. Dering
instantly sprang up, followed by the girls, and ran up stairs.

Since her sickness, Ernestine had slept alone, and Bea had gone over
with Olive; so now, as they hurried in, they saw her untumbled bed, with
just the slight pressure made where she had lain down, as though gone to
bed for the night; everything else was unchanged. Mrs. Dering sank
trembling into a chair, and pointed to a paper lying on the table.
Olive reached it, and read aloud in a frightened, awe-struck voice:

"DARLING MAMA:

"I'm going away; I can't stay, and oh please don't look for me;
for I could not come back. It seems as though my heart was
broken, and it nearly made me crazy to think that I was all
alone in the world, except a wicked, cruel father. Oh, I never
knew how much I loved you all, until I found that I was
nothing--neither daughter nor sister. I have taken the twenty
dollars in gold, and fifteen dollars that I saved from my
teaching, and I will go some where and work for my living. I
know it will grieve you, and that is all that has kept me from
going before; but I could not stand it any longer; something
made me go. Oh, please forgive me, and do not look for me. I
love you all so much, and it nearly broke my heart to look at
the girls, and think they were all sisters, and you their own
mama, while I was nothing. Don't grieve for me, please, but do
love me.

"ERNESTINE."

CHAPTER XIII.

A YEAR LATER.

Kathleen was sitting in the swing, and idly pushing a hole in the saw
dust, with the toe of her shoe; while Katherine sat on a log hemming a
handkerchief, a red rose stuck in her hair, and much thoughtfulness in
her face.

"I think it's too horrible to think about," said the former, suddenly,
and with a vinegary aspect of countenance.

"He may be nice," returned the latter, consolingly, though with much
evident distaste to the fact.

"Who cares, and then besides, I bet he isn't."

"You mustn't bet."

"I will. You may be nice, and proper, and so awfully prim, if you want
to, but I sha'n't."

"You'r