y doubts to which that
bit of stuff may have given rise," he said. "She was, as you supposed,
detained late by her employers, and she fainted in the work-room. They
most unwisely and unkindly let her go home alone, without giving her
any stimulant, as soon as she came to her senses again. Nothing is more
probable, under these circumstances, than that she should faint a second
time on her way here. A fall on the pavement, without any friendly arm
to break it, might have produced even a worse injury than the injury
we see. I believe that the only ill usage to which the poor girl was
exposed was the neglect she met with in the work-room."

"You speak very reasonably, I own, sir," said I, not yet quite
convinced. "Still, perhaps she may--"

"My poor girl, I told you not to hope," said the doctor, interrupting
me. He went to Mary, and lifted up her eyelids, and looked at her eyes
while he spoke; then added, "If you still doubt how she came by that
blow, do not encourage the idea that any words of hers will ever
enlighten you. She will never speak again."

"Not dead! Oh, sir, don't say she's dead!"

"She is dead to pain and sorrow--dead to speech and recognition. There
is more animation in the life of the feeblest insect that flies than
in the life that is left in her. When you look at her now, try to think
that she is in heaven. That is the best comfort I can give you, after
telling the hard truth."

I did not believe him. I could not believe him. So long as she breathed
at all, so long I was resolved to hope. Soon after the doctor was gone,
Sally came in again, and found me listening (if I may call it so) at
Mary's lips. She went to where my little hand-glass hangs against the
wall, took it down, and gave it to me.

"See if the breath marks it," she said.

Yes; her breath did mark it, but very faintly. Sally cleaned the
glass with her apron, and gave it back to me. As she did so, she half
stretched out her hand to Mary's face, but drew it in again suddenly, as
if she was afraid of soiling Mary's delicate skin with her hard, horny
fingers. Going out, she stopped at the foot of the bed, and scraped away
a little patch of mud that was on one of Mary's shoes.

"I always used to clean 'em for her," said Sally, "to save her hands
from getting blacked. May I take 'em off now, and clean 'em again?"

I nodded my head, for my heart was too heavy to speak. Sally took the
shoes off with a slow, awkward tenderness, and went ou