le features seemed to point out sharply; her whole
face had the look of a wedge that could pierce fate. After breakfast
she went out of the room, and returned shortly with her hat on.

"Mother," said she.

"What is it?"

"You'd better know what I'm going to do."

"What are you goin' to do?"

"I'm goin' down to that lawyer's office, and--tell him." Lois turned
toward the door.

"I s'pose you know all you're goin' to do," said her mother, in a
hard voice.

"I'm going to tell the truth," returned Lois, fiercely.

"You're goin' to put your mother in State's prison."

Lois stopped. "Mother, you can't make me believe that."

"It's true, whether you believe it or not. I don't know anything
about law, but I'm sure enough of that."

Lois stood looking at her mother. "Then I'll put you there," said
she, in a cruel voice. "That's where you ought to go, mother."

She went out of the room, and shut the door hard behind her; then she
kept on through the house to the front porch, and sat down. She sat
there all the morning, huddled up against a pillar. Her mother worked
about the house; Lois could hear her now and then, and every time she
shuddered. She had a feeling that the woman in the house was not her
mother. Had she been familiar with the vampire superstition, she
might have thought of that, and had a fancy that some fiend animated
the sober, rigid body of the old New England woman with evil and
abnormal life.

At noon Lois went in and ate some dinner mechanically; then she
returned. Presently, as she sat there, a bell began tolling, and a
funeral procession passed along the road below. Lois watched it
listlessly--the black-draped hearse, the slow-marching bearers, the
close-covered wagons, and the nodding horses. She could see it
plainly through the thin spring branches. It was quite a long
procession; she watched it until it passed. The cemetery was only a
little way below the house, on the same side of the street. By
twisting her head a little, she could have seen the black throng at
the gate.

After a while the hearse and the carriages went past on their
homeward road at a lively pace, the gate clicked, and Mrs. Jane
Maxwell and a young man came up the walk.

Lois stood up shrinkingly as they approached, the door behind her
opened, and she heard her mother's voice.

"Good-afternoon," said Mrs. Field, with rigid ceremony, her mouth
widened in a smile.

"Good-afternoon, Esther," returned Mrs. Maxwell.