“Don’t fret,” she said, while tears rolled down her own face; “there’s three on ’em yet, as wants their mother to take care on ’em.”

She seemed to have touched with instinctive skill the right chord for consolation.  Mrs. Clarkson spoke again after a minute with a steadier and calmer voice,

“You’ll lay him by me now?” she said.  “It can’t wake him out of his sleep, and I’d like to see him till the last.  Is Mrs. Morton there still?”

Bella came to her.

“Did you see him go?” she asked.  “I was very thankful to you before, but I am more now, because you came just in time.  Don’t you think the little ones that never spoke in this world will be able to speak up there?”

“Yes, I think so,” Bella answered, fancying that her mind began to wander.

“And so you see my man is sure to ask what we were all doing, and the little one would be able to tell him how good you’d been to us.”

She stopped; tears flowed softly, but she was too weak for violent grief; and so the two girls left her, after having given the nurse money for present use, and learned what comforts were most needed.

On their return they did not stop at all in Cacouna, but drove straight to the Cottage.  Mrs. Bellairs was still there, and sent word to her sister by Margery to dismiss the sleigh and come in, that they might return home together.  They found the two ladies sitting “conferring by the parlour fire,” and eager to hear the result of their visit to Beaver Creek.  Lucia saw that the narration must come from her; for Bella, worn out by the painful excitement of the morning, was incapable of describing what had so greatly moved her, and could scarcely bear even to hear the baby’s death spoken of as a thing not to be regretted.

“Poor little creature!” Mrs. Bellairs said.  “Even the mother by-and-by may be glad it is gone.”

“Elise!” Bella cried impatiently, “how can you be so cruel?  And you are a mother yourself!”

“You forget, dear, what a fate those children have; and yet, since you feel so pitifully towards them, it certainly does not become me to be less charitable;” and the kind-hearted woman wiped furtively the tears of genuine compassion which she had been shedding over the sorrows of the Clarksons, and never thought of defending herself from her sister’s blame; though, to tell the truth, she had not in her whole nature a single spark of cruelty or uncharitableness, and that Bella knew perfectly well.

Lucia went on to mention the things really needed by the squatter’s family.  Mrs. Costello turned to Bella,

“Do you really mean,” she asked, “to keep them on the farm after this winter?”

“Yes.  I certainly shall not allow them to be turned out as long as they like to stay.  I am going to have the land cleared and put under cultivation.  I suppose it will be necessary to have a kind of foreman or manager of some sort there; and it has occurred to me that Mrs. Clarkson might take him as a lodger.  But before that can be done, the house would have to be enlarged and several alterations made.  I must consult William about it.”