“Richard,” interrupted his sister, with intensity of feeling in her voice, “I see what you are trying to persuade yourself:  do not tell me, after what has passed, you still feel that you are bound to her—­”

“Bound!” exclaimed Richard, with a vehemence most strange in him, as, pacing the room, he stood still before his sister.  His back was toward me.  She was so absorbed she did not see me as I darted past the folding-doors into the hall.  As I flew panting up to my own room, I remember one feeling above all others, the first feeling of affection toward the house that I had ever had.  It was mine no longer, my home never again; I had no right to stay in it a moment:  my own room was not mine any more—­the room where I had learned to pray, and to try to lead a good life—­the room where I had lain when I was so near to death—­the room where Sister Madeline had led me to such peaceful, quiet thoughts.  I had but one wish now, not to see Richard, to escape Sophie, to get away forever from this house to which I had no right.  I pulled down my hat and my street things, and dressed so quickly, that I had slipped down the stairs, and out into the street, before they had ceased talking in the parlor.  I heard their voices, very low, as I passed through the hall.  I fully meant never to come back to the house again—­not to be turned out.

My heart swelled as the door closed behind me.  It was dreadful not to have a home.  I was so unused to being in the street alone, that I felt frightened when I reached the cars and stopped them.

I was going to Sister Madeline.  She would take me, and keep me, and teach me where to live, and how.  I was a little confused, and got out at the wrong street, and had to walk several blocks before I reached the house.

The servant at the door met me with an answer that made me wonder whether there were anything else to happen to me on that day.

Sister Madeline had been called away—­had gone on a long journey—­something about the illness of her brother; and I must not come inside the door, for a contagious disease was raging, and the orders were strict that no one be admitted.  I had walked so fast, and in such excitement of feeling, that I was weak and faint when I turned to go down the steps.  Where should I go?  I walked on slowly now, and undecided, for I had no aim.

The clergyman to whom I had gone for direction in matters spiritual, was ill—­for two weeks had given up even Lenten duties.  Anything—­but I could not go home, or rather where home had been.  I walked and walked till I was almost fainting, and found myself in the Park.  There the lovely indications of spring, and the quiet, and the fresh air, soothed me, and I sat down under some trees near the water, and rested myself.  But the same giddy whirl of thoughts came back, the same incompetency to deal with such strange facts, and the same confusion.  I do not know how long I wandered about; but I was faint and weary and hungry, and frightened too, for people were beginning to look at me.