“Bless what?” asked the doctor, half out of the door.

“The Flower Charity,” said the Lady of Shalott.

“Amen!” said the doctor.  “But I’ll attend to it directly.”  And he was quite out of the door, and the door was shut.

“Sary Jane, dear?” said, the Lady of Shalott, a few minutes after the door was shut.

“Well!” said Sary Jane.

“The glass is broken,” said the Lady of Shalott.

“Should think I might know that!” said Sary Jane, who was down upon her knees, sweeping shining pieces away into a pasteboard dust-pan.

“Sary Jane, dear?” said the Lady of Shalott again.

“Dear, dear!” echoed Sary Jane, tossing purple feathers out of the window and seeming, to the eyes of the Lady of Shalott, to have the spray of green waves upon her hands.  “There they go!”

“Yes, there they go,” said the Lady of Shalott.  But she said no more till night.

It was a hot night for South Street.  It was a very hot night for even South Street.  The lean children in the attic opposite cried savagely, like lean cubs.  The monkeys from the spring-box came out and sat upon the lid for air.  Dirty people lay around the dirty hydrant; and the purple wing stretched itself a little in a quiet way, to cover them.

“Sary Jane, dear?” said the Lady of Shalott, at night.  “The glass is broken.  And, Sary Jane, dear, I am afraid I can’t stand it as well as you can.”

Sary Jane gave the Lady of Shalott a sharp look, and put away her nankeen vests.  She came to the bed.

“It isn’t time to stop sewing, is it?” asked the Lady of Shalott, in faint surprise.  Sary Jane only gave her sharp looks, and said,—­

“Nonsense!  That man will be back again yet.  He’ll look after ye, maybe.  Nonsense!”

“Yes,” said the Lady of Shalott, “he will come back again.  But my glass is broken.”

“Nonsense!” said Sary Jane.  But she did not go back to her sewing.  She sat down on the edge of the bed, by the Lady of Shalott; and it grew dark.

“Perhaps they’ll do something about the yards; who knows?” said Sary Jane through the growing dark.

“But my glass is broken,” said the Lady of Shalott.

“Sary Jane, dear!” said the Lady of Shalott, when it had grown quite, quite dark.  “He is walking on the waves.”

“Nonsense!” said Sary Jane.  For it was quite, quite dark.

“Sary Jane, dear!” said the Lady of Shalott.  “Not that man.  But there is a man, and he is walking on the waves.”

The Lady of Shalott raised herself upon her little calico night-dress sleeve.  She looked at the wall where the 10 X 6 inch looking-glass had hung.

“Sary Jane, dear!” said the Lady of Shalott.  “I am glad that girl is down by the waves.  I am very glad.  But the glass is broken.”

Two days after, the Board of Health at the foot of the precipice, which the lessor called a flight of stairs, which led into the Lady of Shalott’s palace, were met and stopped by another board.