pink cheeks and her gay attire, in the house
instead of her mother. Her head began to reel. She no longer wept.
She became dimly conscious, after a while, of her aunt Maria's
shaking her violently and calling her by name, but she did not
respond, although she heard her plainly. Then she felt a great jounce
of the bed as her aunt sprang out. She continued to lie still and
rigid. She somehow knew, however, that her aunt was lighting the
lamp, then she felt, rather than saw, the flash of it across her
face. Her aunt Maria pulled on a wrapper over her night-gown, and
hurried to the door. "Harry, Harry Edgham!" she heard her call, and
still Maria could not move. Then she also felt, rather than saw, her
father enter the room with his bath-robe slipped over his pajamas,
and approach the bed.

"What on earth is the matter?" he said. He also laid hands on Maria,
and, at his touch, she became able to move.

"What on earth is the matter?" he asked again.

"She didn't seem able to speak or move, and I was scared," replied
Aunt Maria, with a reproachful accent on the "I"; but Harry Edgham
was too genuinely concerned at his little daughter's white face and
piteous look to heed that at all.

He leaned over and began stroking her soft little cheeks, and kissing
her. "Father's darling," he whispered. Then he said over his shoulder
to Aunt Maria, "I wish you would go into my room and get that flask
of brandy I keep in my closet."

Aunt Maria obeyed. She returned with the flask and a teaspoon, and
Maria's father made her swallow a few drops, which immediately warmed
her and made the strange rigidity disappear.

"I guess she had better stay in here with you the rest of the night,"
said Harry to his sister-in-law; but little Maria sat up
determinately.

"No, I'm going back to my own room," she said.

"Hadn't you better stay with your aunt, darling?"

Harry Edgham looked shamefaced and guilty. He saw that his
sister-in-law and Maria had been weeping, and he knew why, in the
depths of his soul. He saw no good reason why he should feel so
shamed and apologetic, but he did. He fairly cowered before the
nervous little girl and her aunt.

"Well, let father carry you in there, then," he said; and he lifted
up the slight little thing, carried her across the hall to her room,
and placed her in bed.

It was a very warm night, but Maria was shivering as if with cold. He
placed the coverings over her with clumsy solicitude. Then he bent