her. His mother. Then she was there,
the one whom Helen dreaded most of all, whom she had invested with every
possible terror, hoping now that she would not be in haste to come down.
She might have spared herself anxiety on this point, as the lady in
question was not anxious to meet a person who, could she have had her
way, would not have been there at all.

From the first moment of consciousness after the long hours of
suffering, Katy had asked for Helen, rather than her mother, feeling
that the former would be more welcome, and could more easily conform
to their customs.

"Send for Helen; I am so tired, and she could always rest me," was her
reply, when asked by Wilford what he could do for her. "Send for Helen;
I want her so much," she had said to Mrs. Cameron, when she came,
repeating the wish until a consultation was held between the mother and
son, touching the propriety of sending for Helen. "She would be of no
use whatever, and might excite our Katy. Quiet is highly important just
now," Mrs. Cameron had said, thus veiling under pretended concern for
Katy her aversion to the girl whose independence in declining her
dressmaker had never been forgiven, and whom she had set down in her
mind as rude and ignorant.

She was well suited with Katy now, petting and caressing and talking
constantly of her; but it did not follow that she must like the sister,
too, and so she checked the impulse which would have prompted Wilford to
send for her as Katy so much desired.

"If her coming would do Katy harm she ought not to come," and so
Wilford's conscience was partially quieted, white Katy in her darkened
room moaned on.

"Send for Sister Helen, please send for Sister Helen."

At last on the fourth day came Mrs. Banker, Mark Ray's mother, to the
house, and in consideration of the strong liking she had evinced for
Katy ever since her arrival in New York, and the great respect felt for
her by Mrs. Cameron, she was admitted to the chamber and heard the
plaintive pleadings: "Send for Sister Helen," until her motherly heart
was touched, and as she sat with her son at dinner she spoke of the
young girl-mother moaning so for Helen.

Whether it was Mark's great pity for Katy, or whether he was prompted
by some more selfish motive, we do not profess to say, but that he was
greatly excited was very evident from his manner, as he exclaimed:

"Why not send for Helen, then? She is a splendid girl, and they idolize
each other. Ta