"What can I say, child? I can only wait—wait."
"Wait! What do you mean? Oh, I know—I know!"
The girl broke off with a more violent shudder and buried her face in her hands.
"What made you remind me?" she cried. "I shall go crazy now. Bessie! Bessie!"
But this time, when the girl clung to her, Elizabeth removed her hands, not impatiently, but with quiet firmness.
"You must control yourself," she said. "I have upon me all that I can bear now. Be still, Elsie!"
"I will! I will!" she sobbed. "Oh, wouldn't it be better to be dead?"
"Better! Yes, a thousand times; but it is not easy to die."
Elsie checked her sobs again, and caught at the hope with which she had sustained herself all day.
"This is the last of it," she said; "this night once safely over, and there is an end."