grant he is anywhere
else! The place is so drearily desolate."

Desolate indeed! The moonbeams streaming through the door threw their
fair light upon the rough boards and upon the walls, and upon the quiet
figure lying on the pallet in one of the corners, touching with pitying
whiteness the homely face upon the pillow and the hand that rested
motionless upon the floor.

The doctor went down on his knees at the pallet's side, and thrust his
hand into the breast of the coarse garments with a half-checked groan.

"Asleep?" broke from Langley's white lips in a desperate whisper.
"Not--not"--

"Dead!" said the doctor--"dead for hours!" There was actual anguish in
his voice as he uttered the words, but another element predominated
in the exclamation which burst from him scarcely a second later. "Good
God!" he cried--"good God!"

Langley bent down and caught him almost fiercely by the arm: the
exclamation jarred upon him. "What is it?" he demanded, "What do you
mean?"

"It is--a woman!"

Even as they gazed at each other in speechless questioning the silence
was broken in upon. Swift, heavy footsteps neared the door, crossed the
threshold, and Janner's daughter stood before them.

There was no need for questioning. One glance told her all. She made her
way to the moonlit corner, pushed both aside with rough strength, and
knelt down. "I might ha' knowed," she said with helpless bitterness--"I
might ha' knowed;" and she laid her face against the dead hand in a
sudden passion of weeping. "I might ha' knowed, Jinny lass," she cried,
"but I didna. It was loike aw th' rest as tha' should lay thee down an'
die loike this. Tha' wast alone aw along, an' tha'' wast alone at th'
last. But dunnot blame me, poor lass. Nay, I know tha' wiltna."

The two men stood apart, stirred by an emotion too deep for any spoken
attempt at sympathy. She scarcely seemed to see them: she seemed to
recognize no presence but that of the unresponsive figure upon its
lowly couch. She spoke to it as if it had been a living thing, her
voice broken and tender, stroking the hair now and then with a touch all
womanly and loving. "Yo' were nigher to me than most foak, Jinny," she
said; "an' tha' trusted me, I know."

They left her to her grief until at last she grew calmer and her sobs
died away into silence. Then she rose and approaching Langley, who stood
at the door, spoke to him, scarcely raising her tear-stained eyes. "I
ha' summat to tell yo' an'