d and quiet disposition is thus carried
beyond all the bounds of reason and self-restraint, it is natural that
everybody round her should be doubly alarmed. Lucy's maid hung about the
door, and the nurse, wrapped in a shawl, stole out of little Tom's room.
They thought their mistress had the hysterics, and almost forced their
way into the room to help her. It did Sir Tom good to send these
busybodies away. But he was more anxious himself than words could say.
He drew her arms within his, and walked up and down with her. "You know,
my darling, what the Bible says, 'that one shall be taken and another
left; and that the wind bloweth where it listeth,'" he said, with a
pardonable mingling of texts. "We must just take care of him, dear, and
hope the best."

Here Lucy stopped, and looked him in the face with an air of solemnity
that startled him.

"I have been thinking," she said; "God has tried us with happiness
first. That is how He always does--and if we abuse _that_ then there
comes--the other. We have been so happy. Oh, so happy!" Her face, which
had been stilled by this profounder wave of feeling, began to quiver
again. "I did not think any one could be so happy," she said.

"Well, my darling! and you have been very thankful and good----"

"Oh, no, no, no," she cried. "I have forgotten my trust. I have let the
poor suffer, and put aside what was laid upon me--and now, now----" Lucy
caught her husband's arm with both her hands, and drew him close to her.
"Tom, God has sent his angel to warn us," she said, in a broken voice.

"Lucy, Lucy, this is not like you. Do you think that poor little woman
has lost her baby for our sake? Are we of so much more importance than
she is, in the sight of God, do you think? Come, come, that is not like
you."

Lucy gazed at him for a moment with a sudden opening of her eyes, which
were contracted with misery. She was subdued by the words, though she
only partially comprehended them.

"Don't you think," he said, "that to deprive another woman of her child
in order to warn you, would be unjust, Lucy? Come and sit down and warm
your poor little hands, and take back your reason, and do not accuse God
of wrong, for that is not possible. Poor Ellen I don't doubt is composed
and submissive, while you, who have so little cause----"

She gave him a wild look. "With her it is over, it is over!" she cried,
"but with us----"

Lucy had never been fanciful, but love quickens the imagination a