d
in a tone that made her feel as if he had flung an icy shower of water in
her face; and the next moment she heard his quick tread on the garden
path and realized that he was gone.

It was useless to attempt to follow him. Her knees were trembling under
her. Moreover, she knew that she must return to Jeanie. White-lipped,
quivering, she moved to the stairs.

He had utterly misunderstood her; she had but voiced the horrified
thought that must have risen in the minds of thousands when first brought
face to face with that world-wide tragedy. But he had read a personal
meaning into her words. He had deemed her deliberately cruel, ungenerous,
bitter. That he could thus misunderstand her set her heart bleeding
afresh. Oh, they were better apart! How was it possible that there could
ever be any confidence, any intimacy, between them again?

Tears, scalding, blinding tears ran suddenly down her face. She bowed her
head in her hands, leaning upon the banisters....

A voice called to her from above, and she started. What was she doing,
weeping here in selfish misery, when Jeanie--Swiftly she commanded
herself and mounted the stairs. The nurse met her at the top.

"The little one isn't so well," she said. "I thought she was asleep, but
I am afraid she is unconscious."

"Oh, nurse, and I left her!"

There was a sound of such heart-break in Avery's voice that the nurse's
grave face softened in sympathy.

"My dear, you couldn't have done anything," she said. "It is just the
weakness before the end, and we can do nothing to avert it. What about
her mother? Can she come?"

Avery shook her head in despair. "Not for a week."

"Ah!" the nurse said; and that was all. But Avery knew in that moment
that only a few hours more remained ere little Jeanie Lorimer passed
through the Open Gates.

She would not go to bed that night though the child lay wholly
unconscious of her. She knew that she could not sleep.

She did not see Piers again till late. The nurse slipped down to tell him
of Jeanie's condition, and he came up, white and sternly composed, and
stood for many minutes watching the slender, quick-breathing figure that
lay propped among pillows, close to the open window.

Avery could not look at his face during those minutes; she dared not. But
when he turned away at length he bent and spoke to her.

"Are you going to stay here?"

"Yes," she whispered.

He made no attempt to dissuade her. All he said was, "May I wait i