Her brain whirled and seemed to stop.  It refused to grasp so hideous a proposition.  The doctor was momentarily at a loss to know how to deal with this terrible dry-eyed grief.  The set look in her eyes, the terrible calm of her demeanor were so much more alarming than the wildest outpourings of grief would, have been.

“And this seizure, Mrs. Moore.  Tell me exactly how it was brought about,” thinking to turn the current of her thoughts even for a moment.

She told him how Anna had gone out in the early afternoon, without saying where she was going, and how she had returned to the house about five o’clock, looking so pale and ill, that Hannah, an old family servant who still lived with them, noticed it and begged her to sit down while she went to fetch her a cup of tea.  The maid left her sitting by the fire-place reading a paper, and the next thing was the terrible cry that brought them both.  They found her lying on the floor unconscious with the crumpled newspaper in her hand.

“See, here is the paper now, doctor,” and he stooped to pick up the crumpled sheet from which the girl had read her death warrant.  Together they went over it in the hope that it might furnish some clue.  Mrs. Moore’s eyes were the first to fall on the fatal paragraph.  She read it through, then showed it to the doctor.

“That is undoubtedly the cause of the seizure,” said the doctor.

“Oh, my poor, poor darling,” moaned the mother, and the first tears fell.

In the first bitterness of regret, Mrs. Moore imagined that in selfishly abandoning herself to her own grief, she must have neglected her daughter, and her remorse knew no bounds.  Again and again she bitterly denounced herself for giving way to sorrow that now seemed light and trivial, compared to the black hopelessness of the present.

Anna’s mind wandered in her delirium, and she would talk of her marriage and beg Sanderson to let her tell her mother all.  Then she would fancy that she was again with Mrs. Tremont and she would go through the pros and cons of the whole affair.  Should she marry him secretly, as he wished?  Yes, it would be better for poor mama, who needed so many comforts, but was it right?  And then the passionate appeal to Sanderson.  Couldn’t he realize her position?——­

“Yes, darling, it is all right.  Mother understands,” the heartbroken woman would repeat over and over again, but the sick girl could not hear.

And so the days wore on, till at last Anna’s wandering mind turned back to earth, and again took up the burden of living.  There was nothing for her to tell her mother.  In her delirium she had told all, and the mother was prepared to bravely face the worst for her daughter’s sake.

The terrible blow brought mother and daughter closer together than they had been for years.  In their prosperity, the young girl had been busy with her governess and instructors, while her mother had made a fine art of her invalidism and spent the greater part of her time at health resorts, baths and spas.