d to beg her not to think about
it, not to say any more; but she knew she would feel better if she
did.

"I told her I'd go presently; and she waited--the patient little
thing! And I was making my blue bow, and fixing it on, and fussing
with the running, and I forgot! And she couldn't bear to bother me,
and didn't say a word, but waited till she dropped to sleep without
it; and her lips were so red and dry. It was a whole hour that I
let her lie so. She never knew anything after that.

"She waked up all in a rave of light-headedness!

"I thought I should never get over it, Ray. And I never did, way
down in my heart; but I got back into the same wretched nonsense,
and now--here's _mother_!

"It's no use to tell me. I've done it. I've lost my right. It'll
_never_ be given back to me."

"Marion--I wish you could have Mr. Vireo to talk to you; or
Luclarion Grapp. Won't you come home with me, and let them come to
see you? They _know_ about these things, dear."

"Would you take me home?" asked Marion, slowly, looking her in the
face.

"Yes, indeed. Will you come?"

"O, do take me and hide me away, and let me cry!"

She dropped herself, as it were passively, into Rachel Ingraham's
hands. She could not stay among the neighbors, she said. She could
not stay in that house alone, one day.

Ray stayed with her, until after the funeral.

Marion would not go to the church. She had let them decide
everything just as they pleased, thinking only that she could not
think about any of it. Mrs. Kent had been a faithful, humble
church-member for forty years, and the minister and her
fellow-members wanted her to be brought there. There was no room in
the little half-house, where she had lived, for neighbors and
friends to gather, and for the services properly to take place.

So it was decided.

But when the time came, and it was too late to change, Marion
said,--"She belonged to them, and they have done by her. They can
all go, but I can't. To sit up in the front pew as a mourner, and be
looked at, and prayed for, as if I had been a real child, and had
only _lost_ my mother! You know I can't, Ray. I will stay here, and
bear my punishment. May be if I bear it _all_ now--do you believe it
might make any difference?"

Ray stayed with her through the whole.

While all was still in the church, not ten rods off, a carriage came
for them to the little white gate. With the silken blinds down, and
the windows open behind them, i