uld_ make no decision, she could not, it would tear her in pieces to
do it.

The pendulum swung back again, and all this went out, leaving her
mortally tired. Agnes came to the foot of the stairs, a little,
withered, stricken old figure, her apron at her eyes. From behind it she
murmured humbly, between swallowing hard, that she had made some tea and
there was bread and butter ready, and should she boil an egg?

A good and healing pity came into Marise's heart. Poor old Agnes, it was
the end of the world for her, of course. And how touching, how tragic,
how unjust, the fate of dependents, to turn from one source of commands
to another. She ran downstairs on tip-toe and put her arm around the old
woman's shoulder. "I haven't said anything yet, Agnes," she told her,
"because this has come on us so suddenly. But of course Mr. Crittenden
and I will always look out for you. Cousin Hetty . . . you were her best
friend."

The old woman laid her head down on the other's shoulder and wept aloud.
"I miss her so. I miss her so," she said over and over.

"The thing to do for her," thought Marise, as she patted the thin
heaving shoulders, "is to give her something to work at." Aloud she
said, "Agnes, we must get the front room downstairs ready. Mr. Hadley
wants to have Cousin Hetty brought down there. Before we eat we might as
well get the larger pieces of furniture moved out."

Agnes stood up, docilely submitting herself to the command, stopped
crying, and went with Marise into the dim old room, in which nothing had
been changed since the day, twenty years ago, when the furniture had
been put back in place after Cousin Hetty's old mother had lain there,
for the last time.

The two women began to work, and almost at once Agnes was herself again,
stepping about briskly, restored by the familiarity of being once more
under the direction of another. They pulled out the long haircloth sofa,
moved the spindle-legged old chairs into the dining-room, and carried
out one by one the drawers from the high-boy in the corner. From one of
these drawers a yellowed paper fell out. Marise picked it up and glanced
at it. It was a letter dated 1851, the blank page of which had been used
for a game of Consequences. The foolish incoherencies lay there in the
faded ink just as they had been read out, bringing with them the
laughter of those people, so long dead now, who had written them down in
that pointed, old-fashioned handwriting. Marise stood