deadly white, and her hand groped for support.

She drew herself together with a desperate effort, and sat down
breathing quickly. "I am not going to faint," she said, reassuringly.
"It was only for a moment." She gave a shudder. "What a fight it was! We
were only just in time----"

A low voice came from the bed. The patient was talking in her sleep.
"Tell Hadria to come home if she does not want to kill me. Tell her to
come home; it is her duty. I want her."

Then, after a pause, "I have always done _my_ duty,--I have sacrificed
myself for the children. Why do they desert me, why do they desert me?"
And then came a low moaning cry, terrible to hear. The sisters were by
the bedside, in a moment. Their father stood behind them.

"We are here, mother dear; we are here watching by you," Hadria
murmured, with trembling voice.

Algitha touched the thin hand, quietly. "We are with you, mother," she
repeated. "Don't you know that we have been with you for a long time?"

The sick woman seemed to be soothed by the words.

"Both here, both?" she muttered vaguely. And then a smile spread over
the sharpened features; she opened her eyes and looked wistfully at the
two faces bending over her.

A look of happiness came into her dimmed eyes.

"My girls," she said in a dreamy voice, "my girls have come back to
me--I knew they were good girls----"

Then her eyes closed, and she fell into a profound and peaceful
slumber.

CHAPTER XXXIX.

"But, Doctor, is there no hope that with care and time, she will be able
to walk again?"

"I am sorry to say, none whatever. I am only thankful that my patient
has survived at all. It was little short of a miracle, and you must be
thankful for that."

Mrs. Fullerton had always been an active woman, in spite of not being
very robust, and a life passed on a couch had peculiar terrors for her.
The nervous system had been wrecked, not by any one shock or event, but
by the accumulated strains of a lifetime. The constitution was broken
up, once and for all.

A cottage had been taken, as near as possible to the Red House, where
the old couple were to settle for the rest of their days, within reach
of their children and grandchildren. Every wish of the invalid must be
respected, just or unjust. Absolute repose of mind and body was
imperatively necessary, and this could only be attained for her by a
complete surrender, on the part of her children, of any course of action
that she serio