“If those women could see my Californian blankets!” she said to herself, but to Willy she said, “They are very nice, and you may put them away.”

Then she went to her own room and went to bed.  This last shock was too much for her nerves to bear.  In the afternoon Willy brought her some tea, but the poor lady would not get up.  So long as she stayed in bed, people could be kept away from her, but there was nowhere else where she could be in peace.

All night she lay and thought and thought and thought.  What should she do?  She could not endure this condition of things.  There was only one relief that presented itself to her:  she might go to Mr. Perley, her minister, and confide everything to him.  He would tell her what she ought to do.

“But,” she thought, “suppose he should say it should all go to the Peruvians!” And then she had more thinking to do, based upon this contingency, which brought on a headache, and she remained in bed all the next day.

The next morning, Willy Croup, who had begun to regret that she had ever said anything about blankets,—­but how could she have imagined that anybody could be so cut up at what that old Shott woman had said?—­brought Mrs. Cliff a letter.

This was from Edna, stating that she and Ralph and the two negroes had just arrived in New York, from which point they were to sail for Havre.  Edna wished very much to see Mrs. Cliff before she left the country, and wrote that if it would be convenient for that lady, she would run up to Plainton and stay a day or two with her.  There would be time enough for this before the steamer sailed.  When she read this brief note, Mrs. Cliff sprang out of bed.

“Edna come here!” she exclaimed.  “That would be simply ruin!  But I must see her.  I must tell her everything, and let her help me.”

As soon as she was dressed, she went down-stairs and told Willy that she would start for New York that very afternoon.  She had received a letter from Mrs. Horn, and it was absolutely necessary to see her before she sailed.  With only a small leather bag in her hand, and nearly all her ready money and her peace-destroying draft sewed up inside the body of her dress, she left Plainton, and when her friends and neighbors heard that she had gone, they could only ascribe such a sudden departure to the strange notions she had imbibed in foreign parts.  When Plainton people contemplated a journey, they told everybody about it, and took plenty of time to make preparations; but South Americans and Californians would start anywhere at a moment’s notice.  People had thought that Mrs. Cliff was too old to be influenced by association in that way, but it was plain that they had been mistaken, and there were those who were very much afraid that even if the poor lady had got whatever ought to be coming to her from the Valparaiso business, it would have been of little use to her.  Her old principles of economy and prudence must have been terribly shaken.  This very journey to New York would probably cost twenty dollars!