Andrew was inexpressibly relieved when he reached home to find that the dressmaker was gone, and Fanny, having sent Amabel to bed, was chiefly anxious to know how her sister had reached the asylum.  It was not until the latter part of the evening that she brought up the subject of the bank.  “Do look out to-morrow, Andrew Brewster, and be sure to take that money out of the bank to pay Miss Higgins,” she said.  “As for being dunned again by that woman, I won’t!  It’s the last time I’ll ever have her, anyway.  As far as that is concerned, all the money will have to come out of the bank if poor Eva is to be kept where she is.  How much money was there that she had?”

“Just fifty-two dollars and seventy cents,” replied Andrew.  “Jim had left a little that he’d scraped together somehow, with the letter he wrote to her, and he told her if he had work he’d send her more.”

“I’d die before I’d touch it,” said Fanny, fiercely.  Then she looked at Andrew with sudden pity.  “Poor old man,” she said; “it’s mighty hard on you when you’re gettin’ older, and you never say a word to complain.  But I don’t see any other way than to take that money, do you?”

“No,” said Andrew.

“And you don’t think I’m hard to ask it, Andrew?”

“No.”

“God knows if it was your sister and my money, I would take every dollar.  You know I would, Andrew.”

“Yes, I know,” replied Andrew, hoarsely.

“Mebbe she’ll get better before it’s quite gone,” said Fanny.  “You say the doctor gave some hope?”

“Yes, he did, if she was taken proper care of.”

“Well, she shall be.  I’ll go out and steal before she sha’n’t have proper care.  Poor Eva!” Fanny burst into the hysterical wailing which had shaken her from head to foot at intervals during the last twenty-four hours.  Andrew shuddered, thinking that he detected in her cries a resemblance to her sister’s ravings.  “Don’t, don’t, Fanny,” he pleaded.  “Don’t, poor girl.”  He put his arm around her, and she wept on his shoulder, but with less abandon.  “After all, we’ve got each other, and we’ve got Ellen, haven’t we, Andrew?” she sobbed.

“Yes, thank God,” said Andrew.  “Don’t, Fanny.”

“That—­that’s more than money, more than all the wages for all the labor in the world, and that we’ve got, haven’t we, Andrew?  We’ve got what comes to us direct from God, haven’t we?  Don’t think I’m silly, Andrew—­haven’t we?”

“Yes, yes, we have—­you are right, Fanny,” replied Andrew.

“I guess I am, too,” she assented, looking up in Andrew’s poor, worn face with eyes of sudden bravery.  “We’ll get along somehow—­don’t you worry, old man.  I guess we’ll come out all right, somehow.  We’ll use that money in the bank as far as it goes, and then I guess some way will be opened.”

Then there came over Andrew’s exaltation, to which Fanny’s words had spurred his flagging spirit, a damper of utter mortification and guilt.  He felt that he could bear this no longer.  He opened his mouth to tell her what he had done with the money in the bank, when there came a knock on the door, and Fanny fled into the bedroom.  She had unfastened her dress, and her face was stained with tears.  She shut the bedroom door tightly as Andrew opened the outer one.