t the path will reopen--but when?

The third time Keziah looked in at them, the room being all dark but for
a wood-flicker from an unreplenished grate, she gathered courage to say
that supper was ready. Ruth Thrale started up from where she half sat,
half lay, beside the sleeper, exclaiming:--"She's eaten nothing since
the morning. Mother, she'll sink for want of food."

"Now, the Lord forgive me!" said Granny Marrable. "To think I've had my
dinner to-day, and she's been starving!" For, of course, the midday meal
was all over at Costrell's, in normal peace, when Dr. Nash came in laden
with the strange news, and at a loss to tell it.

The withdrawal of her daughter's hand waked the sleeper with a start. "I
was dreaming so nicely," said she. "But I'm cold. Oh dear--what is
it?... I thought I was in Sapps Court, with my little Dave and
Dolly...." She seemed slow to catch again the thread of the life she had
fallen asleep on. Vitality was very low, evidently, and she met an
admonition that she must eat something with:--"Nothing but milk,
please!" It refreshed her, for though she fell back on the pillow with
her eyes closed, she spoke again a moment after.

The thing happened thus. Keziah, authoritatively, insistent, would have
Ruth eat, or try to eat, some supper. Old Phoebe was in no need of it,
and sat on beside old Maisie, who must have dreamed again--one of those
sudden long experiences a few seconds will give to a momentary sleep.
For she opened her eyes to say, with a much greater strength in her
voice:--"I was dreaming of Dolly again, but Dolly wasn't Dolly this time
... only, she _was_ Dolly, somehow!..." Then it was clear that she was
quite in the dark, for the time being, about the events of the past few
hours. For she continued:--"She was Dolly and my sister Phoebe--both at
once--when Phoebe was a little girl--my Phoebe that was drowned. But
Phoebe was older than that when she drew my tooth, as Dolly did in my
dream."

Old Phoebe, it must be borne in mind, although intellectually convinced
that this could be none other than her sister, had never experienced the
conviction that only the revival of joint memories could bring. This
reference to an incident only known to themselves, long forgotten by her
and now flashed suddenly on her out of the past, made her faith that
this was Maisie, in very truth, a reality. But she could not speak.

The dream-gods kept their hold on the half-awakened mind, too old for
an