st asleep. At length, tossing up her right hand, she felt the
resisting lid, and remembered the punishment she had been enduring. She
tried to spring out, but fell back several times on her sleeping arm,
and it was long before she was able to accomplish her release in the
darkness. She knew not where she was jumping, and fell head first
against the master's high-backed chair. If she was hurt she did not know
it, she was so paralyzed by terror. She could not be alone! They would
not be so cruel as to leave her there the live-long winter's night. They
were only frightening her! Mittie must he hiding there, waiting for her.
_She_ was not afraid of the dark.

"Sister," she whispered. "Sister," she murmured, in a louder tone.
"Where are you? Come and take my hand."

The echo of her own voice sounded fearful, in those silent walls. She
dared not call again. Her eyes, accustomed to the gloom, began to
distinguish the outline of objects. She could see where the long rows of
benches stood, and the windows, all except those next the street, grew
whiter and whiter, for the ground was covered with snow, and some of it
had been drifted against the glass. All at once Helen remembered the
_room_, all dressed in white, and she felt the _cold presence_, which
had so often congealed her heart. Her dead mother seemed before her, in
the horror, yet grandeur, of her last repose. Unable to remain passive
in body, with such travail in her soul, she rushed towards the
door--finding the way with her groping hands. It was locked. She tried
the windows--they were fastened. She shrieked--but there was none to
hear. No! there was no escape--no hope. She must stay there the whole
long, dark night, if she lived, to see the morning's dawn. With the
conviction of the hopelessness of her situation, there arose a feeling,
partly despair and partly resignation. She was very cold, for the fire
had long been extinguished, and she could not find her cloak to cover
her.

She was sure she would freeze to death before morning, and Master
Hightower, when he came to open the school, would see her lying stiff
and frozen on the floor, and be sorry he had been so cruel. Yes! she
would freeze, and it was no matter, for no one cared for her; no one
thought of coming to look for her. Father, brother, Miss Thusa,
Mittie--all had deserted her. Had her mother lived, _she_ would have
remembered her little Helen. The young doctor, he who had been so kind
and good, who ha