t she placed her
white little hand upon his shoulder, the golden head bowed for a moment
and her sweet lips touched his sunburnt face.

By remaining quiet that night the colonel would be able to get back to
Thompson City in the morning. Before nine o'clock he was at rest in the
bed-room. A couch for Alice had been prepared in the same room. In the
other--kitchen, parlor and dining-hall--a blanket was thrown down for the
marquis, and two chairs fixed for the bed of Mrs. Ruggles. Before
retiring, however, she sat down at her lonely table, where,
notwithstanding the tea she drank to keep them off, an unusual number of
weak creepings came over her.

"I couldn't help it," was all she said to the tea-pot. Whether she
referred to the tornado, or her kindness to the sufferers, or to the
manner of rendering the kindness, no one knows. That was all she said to
the tea-pot, but to her son, who sat for a while beside her, she spoke in
a low tone: "Markis-dee, you could never c'verse with her. You're better'n
she is. Put her out o' yer head. She laughed at ye."

"But she kissed me wi' tears in 'er eyes afterward," was his answer as he
turned toward his bed on the floor.

An hour later the tea was exhausted, but Mrs. Ruggles yet sat at her
lonely table, as still as the sleepers around her. The clock struck ten:
she nervously drew a soiled paper from her bosom. Eleven: she rose with
hesitation and set the tallow candle behind the door. Then she softly
entered the bed-room and stood before the window where Alice lay. The sky
was clear again. The moon shone on the face and form of the sleeping girl,
making softer their graceful lines, richer the shadows in the golden hair,
tenderer the tint of cheek and lip.

She stepped again into the shade and stole to the colonel's bedside. His
disturbed mind had turned backward over the path of life from the sudden
death escaped, and, sleeping or waking, his memory had been busy with the
people and events of other days.

"John Miller!" she said, in a suppressed tone. He started. "John Miller, I
know ye. Common name--I wa'n't sure afore to-day. When you pulled that
money out o' yer pocket I see that in yer face that satisfied me. It's fer
the good name o' the dead I've come. Elseways I never'd ha' troubled ye."
The astonished colonel shifted his position painfully, prepared to speak
or to listen. "There yer girl lies in the light o' heaven. Nex' room my
boy lies in the shadder an' dark. He don'