Left alone with the sufferer, Mrs. Karnegie carried her to her bed.  As she was laid down her left hand fell helpless over the side of the bed.  Mrs. Karnegie suddenly checked the word of sympathy as it rose to her lips—­suddenly lifted the hand, and looked, with a momentary sternness of scrutiny, at the third finger.  There was a ring on it.  Mrs. Karnegie’s face softened on the instant:  the word of pity that had been suspended the moment before passed her lips freely now.  “Poor soul!” said the respectable landlady, taking appearances for granted.  “Where’s your husband, dear?  Try and tell me.”

The doctor made his appearance, and went up to the patient.

Time passed, and Mr. Karnegie and his daughter, carrying on the business of the hotel, received a message from up stairs which was ominous of something out of the common.  The message gave the name and address of an experienced nurse—­with the doctor’s compliments, and would Mr. Karnegie have the kindness to send for her immediately.

The nurse was found and sent up stairs.

Time went on, and the business of the hotel went on, and it was getting to be late in the evening, when Mrs. Karnegie appeared at last in the parlor behind the bar.  The landlady’s face was grave, the landlady’s manner was subdued.  “Very, very ill,” was the only reply she made to her daughter’s inquiries.  When she and her husband were together, a little later, she told the news from up stairs in greater detail.  “A child born dead,” said Mrs. Karnegie, in gentler tones than were customary with her.  “And the mother dying, poor thing, so far as I can see.”

A little later the doctor came down.  Dead?  No.—­Likely to live?  Impossible to say.  The doctor returned twice in the course of the night.  Both times he had but one answer.  “Wait till to-morrow.”

The next day came.  She rallied a little.  Toward the afternoon she began to speak.  She expressed no surprise at seeing strangers by her bedside:  her mind wandered.  She passed again into insensibility.  Then back to delirium once more.  The doctor said, “This may last for weeks.  Or it may end suddenly in death.  It’s time you did something toward finding her friends.”

(Her friends!  She had left the one friend she had forever!)

Mr. Camp was summoned to give his advice.  The first thing he asked for was the unfinished letter.

It was blotted, it was illegible in more places than one.  With pains and care they made out the address at the beginning, and here and there some fragments of the lines that followed.  It began:  “Dear Mr. Brinkworth.”  Then the writing got, little by little, worse and worse.  To the eyes of the strangers who looked at it, it ran thus:  “I should ill requite * * * Blanche’s interests * * * For God’s sake! * * * don’t think of me * * ” There was a little more, but not so much as one word, in those last lines, was legible.