r, doctor
dear, is there?"

"No, it is not about Lucy. It's about Barton Holt."

"Ye don't tell me! Is he come back?"

"No, nor never will. He's dead!

"That villain dead! How do you know?" Her face paled and her lips
quivered, but she gave no other sign of the shock the news had been to
her.

"Captain Nat, his father, has just left my office. I promised I would
tell Miss Jane to-night. He was too much broken up and too fearful of
its effect upon her to do it himself. I drove fast, but perhaps I'm too
late to see her."

"Well, ye could see her no doubt,--she could throw somethin' around
her--but ye mustn't tell her THAT news. She's been downhearted all day
and is tired out. Bart's dead, is he?" she repeated with an effort at
indifference. "Well, that's too bad. I s'pose the captain's feelin'
putty bad over it. Where did he die?"

"He died in Rio Janeiro of yellow fever," said the doctor slowly,
wondering at the self-control of the woman. Wondering, too, whether she
was glad or sorry over the event, her face and manner showing no index
to her feelings.

"And will he be brought home to be buried?" she asked with a quick
glance at the doctor's face.

"No; they never bring them home with yellow fever."

"And is that all ye come to tell her?" She was scrutinizing Doctor
John's face, her quick, nervous glances revealing both suspicion and
fear.

"I had some other matters to talk about, but if she has retired,
perhaps I had better come to-morrow," answered the doctor in undecided
tones, as he gazed abstractedly at the flickering candle.

The old woman hesitated. She saw that the doctor knew more than he
intended to tell her. Her curiosity and her fear that some other
complication had arisen--one which he was holding back--got the better
of her judgment. If it was anything about her bairn, she could not wait
until the morning. She had forgotten Meg now.

"Well, maybe if ye break it to her easy-like she can stand it. I don't
suppose she's gone to bed yet. Her door was open on a crack when I come
down, and she always shuts it 'fore she goes to sleep. I'll light a
couple o' lamps so ye can see, and then I'll send her down to ye if
she'll come. Wait here, doctor, dear."

The lamps lighted and Martha gone, Doctor John looked about the room,
his glance resting on the sofa where he had so often sat with her; on
the portrait of Morton Cobden, the captain's friend; on the work-basket
filled with needlework that Jane