ones of the
dying girl as she bade her friends adieu. Convulsed with grief Lucy
knelt by the bedside, pressing to her lips one little clammy hand, and
accusing herself of destroying her sister's life. In the furthest
corner of the room sat Mr. Dayton. He could not stand by and see
stealing over his daughter's face the dark shadow which falls but once
on all. He could not look upon her when over her soft brown eyes the
white lids closed forever. Like a naked branch in the autumn wind his
whole frame shook with agony, and though each fiber of grandma's heart
was throbbing with anguish, yet for the sake of her son she strove to
be calm, and soothed him as she would a little child. Berintha, too,
was there, and while her tears were dropping fast, she supported
Lizzie in her arms, pushing back from her pale brow the soft curls
which, damp with the moisture of death, lay in thick rings upon her
forehead.

"Has Harry come?" said Lizzie.

The answer was in the negative, and a moan of disappointment came from
her lips.

Again she spoke: "Give him my Bible--and my curls--when I am dead let
Lucy arrange them--she knows how; then cut them off, and the best, the
longest, the brightest is for Harry; the others for you all. And
tell--tell--tell him to meet--me in heaven--where I'm--going--going."

A stifled shriek from Lucy, as she fell back fainting, told that with
the last word, "going," Lizzie had gone to heaven!

An hour after the tolling bell arrested the attention of many, and of
the few who asked for whom it tolled nearly all involuntarily sighed
and said, "Poor Harry! Died before he came home!"

* * * * *

It was the night before the burial, and in the back parlor stood a
narrow coffin containing all that was mortal of Lizzie Dayton. In the
front parlor Bridget and another domestic kept watch over the body of
their young mistress. Twelve o'clock rang from the belfry of St.
Luke's church, and then the midnight silence was broken by the shrill
scream of the locomotive as the eastern train thundered into the
depot. But the senses of the Irish girls were too profoundly locked in
sleep to heed that common sound; neither did they hear the outer door,
which by accident had been left unlocked, swing softly open, nor saw
they the tall figure which passed by them into the next room--the room
where stood the coffin.

Suddenly through the house there echoed a cry, so long, so loud, so
despairing,