away
in a dream-world, for any consciousness they showed of her presence.

That was on the stroke of one; and for two full hours after all was
silence, but for the records of the clock at its intervals, and the
cricket dwelling on the same theme our forefathers heard and gave no
heed to, a thousand years ago. Then old Phoebe woke to wonder, for a
blank moment, what had happened that she should be sitting there alone,
with the lazy flicker of a charred faggot helping out a dim, industrious
rushlight in a shade. But only till she saw that she was _not_ alone. It
all came back then. The figure on the bed!--not _dead_, surely?

No--for the hand she held was warm enough to reassure her. It had been
the terror of a moment, that this changed creature, with memories that
none but Maisie could have known, had flashed into her life to vanish
from it, and leave her bewildered, almost without a word of that
inexplicable past. Only of a moment, for the hand she held tightened on
hers, and the still face that was, and was not, her dead sister's turned
to her, looked at her open-eyed, and spoke.

"I think I am not dreaming now, but I was.... I was dreaming of Phoebe,
years ago.... But _you_ are Phoebe. Say that I am Maisie, that I may
hear you. Say it!"

"Oh, my darling!--I know you are Maisie. But it is so hard to know."

"Yes--it is all so hard to know--so hard to think! But I know it is
true.... Oh, Phoebe, where do you think I was but now, in my dream?...
Yes, where?--What place?... Guess!"

"I cannot tell ... back in the old time?"

"Back in the old time--back in the old place. I was shelling peas to
help old Keturah--old Keturah that had had three husbands, and her old
husband then was the sexton, and he had buried them all three! We were
there, under her porch ... with the honeysuckle all in flower--and, oh,
the smell of it in the heat!--it was all there in my dream! And you were
there. Oh, Phoebe darling, how beautiful you were! We were seventeen."

"Ah, my dear, I know when that was. 'Twas the day _they_ came--came
first. Oh, God be good to us!"

"Oh, Phoebe dear, why be so heartbroken? It was a merry time. Thank God
for it with me, darling!... Ay, I know--all over now!..."

"I mind it well, dear. They came up on their horses."

"Thornton and Ralph. And made a pretext they would like to see inside
the Church. Because old Keturah had the key."

"But 'twas an untruth! Little care they had for inside the Church! 'T