ad he been the
merest stranger. Nevertheless she waited and watched for John
Phillips' homecoming.

At ten o'clock she heard his voice in the kitchen. She leaned out of
the bed and pulled open her door. She heard voices below, but could
not distinguish the words, so she rose and went noiselessly out into
the hall, knelt down by the stair railing and listened. The door of
the kitchen was open below her and a narrow shaft of light struck on
her white, intent face. She looked like a woman waiting for the decree
of doom.

At first John and Amelia talked of trivial matters. Then the latter
said abruptly:

"Did you hear how Stephen Fair was?"

"He's dying," was the brief response.

Emily heard Amelia's startled exclamation. She gripped the square
rails with her hands until the sharp edges dinted deep into her
fingers. John's voice came up to her again, harsh and expressionless:

"He took a bad turn the day before yesterday and has been getting
worse ever since. The doctors don't expect him to live till morning."

Amelia began to talk rapidly in low tones. Emily heard nothing
further. She got up and went blindly back into her room with such
agony tearing at her heartstrings that she dully wondered why she
could not shriek aloud.

Stephen--her husband--dying! In the burning anguish of that moment her
own soul was as an open book before her. The love she had buried rose
from the deeps of her being in an awful, accusing resurrection.

Out of her stupor and pain a purpose formed itself clearly. She must
go to Stephen--she must beg and win his forgiveness before it was too
late. She dared not go down to John and ask him to take her to her
husband. He might refuse. The Phillipses had been known to do even
harder things than that. At the best there would be a storm of protest
and objection on her brother's and sister's part, and Emily felt that
she could not encounter that in her present mood. It would drive her
mad.

She lit a lamp and dressed herself noiselessly, but with feverish
haste. Then she listened. The house was very still. Amelia and John
had gone to bed. She wrapped herself in a heavy woollen shawl hanging
in the hall and crept downstairs. With numbed fingers she fumbled at
the key of the hall door, turned it and slipped out into the night.

The storm seemed to reach out and clutch her and swallow her up. She
went through the garden, where the flowers already were crushed to
earth; she crossed the long fiel