ty, would presently collapse.

Carterette, with all her seeming lightsomeness, had sense and
self-possession. She tenderly put the water to Guida's lips, with
comforting words, though her own brain was in a whirl, and dark
forebodings flashed through her mind.

"Ah, man gui, man pethe!" she said in the homely patois. "There, drink,
drink, dear, dear couzaine." Guida's lips opened, and she drank slowly,
putting her hand to her heart with a gesture of pain. Carterette
put down the hanap and caught her hands. "Come, come, these cold
hands--pergui, but we must stop that! They are so cold." She rubbed them
hard. "The poor child of heaven--what has come over you? Speak to me...
ah, but see, everything will come all right by and by! God is good.
Nothing's as bad as what it seems. There was never a grey wind but
there's a greyer. Nanningia, take it not so to heart, my couzaine; thou
shalt have love enough in the world.... Ah, grand doux d'la vie, but
I could kill him!" she added under her breath, and she rubbed Guida's
hands still, and looked frankly, generously into her eyes.

Yet, try as she would in that supreme moment, Carterette could not feel
all she once felt concerning Guida. There is something humiliating in
even an undeserved injury, something which, to the human eye, lessens
the worthiness of its victim. To this hour Carterette had looked upon
her friend as a being far above her own companionship. All in a moment,
in this new office of comforter the relative status was altered. The
plane on which Guida had moved was lowered. Pity, while it deepened
Carterette's tenderness, lessened the gap between them.

Perhaps something of this passed through Guida's mind, and the deep
pride and courage of her nature came to her assistance. She withdrew her
hands and mechanically smoothed back her hair, then, as Carterette sat
watching her, folded up the sewing and put it in the work-basket hanging
on the wall.

There was something unnatural in her governance of herself now. She
seemed as if doing things in a dream, but she did them accurately and
with apparent purpose. She looked at the clock, then went to the fire to
light it, for it was almost time to get her grandfather's tea. She did
not seem conscious of the presence of Carterette, who still sat on the
veille, not knowing quite what to do. At last, as the flame flashed up
in the chimney, she came over to her friend, and said:

"Carterette, I am going to the Dean's. Will