merrily in the fireplace and the discordant noises of
the house resolved themselves into vague harmony. A cricket, safely
ensconced for the Winter in a crevice of the hearth, awoke in the
unaccustomed warmth, piping a shrill and cheery welcome, but Miss
Evelina sat abstractedly, staring into the fire.

After all, there had never been anything but happiness in the
house--the misery had been outside. Peace and quiet content had dwelt
there securely, but the memory of it brought no balm now.

As though it were yesterday, the black walnut chair, covered with
haircloth, stood primly against the wall. Miss Evelina had always
hated the chair, and here, after twenty-five years, it confronted her
again. She mused, ironically, upon the permanence of things usually
considered transient and temporary. Her mother's sewing was still upon
the marble-topped table, but the hands that held it were long since
mingled with the dust. Her own embroidery had apparently but just
fallen from the chair, and the dream that had led to its
fashioning--was only a dream, from which she awoke to enduring agony.
With swift hatred, she turned her back upon the embroidery frame, and
hid her face in her hands.

Time, as time, had ceased to exist for her. She suffered until
suffering brought its own far anodyne--the inability to sustain it
further,--then she slept, from sheer weariness. Before dawn, usually,
she awoke, sufficiently rested to suffer again. When she felt faint,
she ate, scarcely knowing what she ate, for food was as dust and ashes
in her mouth.

In the bag that hung from her belt was a vial of laudanum, renewed from
time to time as she feared its strength was waning. She had been
taught that it was wicked to take one's own life, and that God was
always kind. Not having experienced the kindness, she began to doubt
the existence of God, and was immediately face to face with the idea
that it could not be wrong to die if one was too miserable to live.
Her mind revolved perpetually in this circle and came continually back
to a compromise. She would live one more day, and then she would free
herself. There was always a to-morrow when she should be free, but it
never came.

The fire died down and the candle had but a few minutes more to burn.
It was the hour of the night when life is at its lowest--when souls
pass out into the great Beyond. Miss Evelina took the vial from her
reticule and uncorked it. The bitter, pungent odour