a biting wind flung a handful of powdery snow in his
face,--the sparkling coldness of the day; and he thought to himself,
"this is about the last chance for skating! There'll be a thaw next
week." So, when he came back, whistling, to the library, he said: "Are
you game for skating? It's cold as blazes!"

And Edith said: "You bet I am! Only we'll have to go to Fern Hill for my
skates!"

Maurice said, "All right!" and off they went, the glowing vigor and
youth of them a beauty in itself!

So it was that when Eleanor got home, after having gently and patiently
sung to poor Donny for nearly an hour, the library was empty; but a note
on the mantelpiece said: "We've gone skating.--E. and M." "She waited
until I went out," Eleanor thought; "_then_ she suggested it to him!"
She sat down, huddling over the fire, and thinking how Maurice neglected
her; "He doesn't want me. He likes to go off with Edith, alone!" They
had probably gone to the river--"our river!"--that broad part just below
the meadow, where there was apt to be good skating. That made her
remember the September day and the picnic, when Edith had talked about
jealousy--"Bingoism," she had called it. "She tried to attract him by
being _smart_. I detest smartness!" The burning pain under her
breastbone was intolerable. She thought of the impertinent things Edith
had said that day--and the ridiculous inference that if the person of
whom you were jealous, was more attractive in any way than you were
yourself, it was unreasonable to be jealous;--"get busy, and _be_
attractive!" Edith had said, with pert shallowness. "She doesn't know
what she's talking about!" Eleanor said; and jealousy seared her mind as
a flame might have seared her flesh. "I haven't skated since I was a
girl.... I--I believe next winter I'll take it up again." The tears
stood in her eyes.

It was at that moment that the telegram was brought into the library.

"Mr. Curtis isn't in," Eleanor told the maid; then she did what anyone
would do, in the absence of the person to whom the dispatch was
addressed; signed for it ... opened it ... read it.

_Jacky's sick; please come over quick.

L. D_.

"There's no answer," she said. When the maid had left the room,
Maurice's wife moistened the flap of the flimsy brown envelope--it had
been caught only on one side; got up, went into the hall, laid the
dispatch on the table, came back to the library, and fainted dead away.

No one heard her fall, so no on