“Come,” she cried again, “let us laugh, let us sing! Come, come, come!”
Elsie led the way into the house, and went directly toward the library, leaving wet tracks upon the carpet, and wrapping her dripping garments close about her.
The old people and Catharine followed in silence, shuddering with the dampness and chilled with the cold, but carried on by the force of that insane will.
Elsie flung open the library-door. A gust of wind swept through, meeting them as they entered from the bay-window, which was open to the night.
“Give me light, light! I would look on him; I will tell him myself.”
Catharine struck a light, which flared and quivered as she held it upward.
Elsie seized it fiercely and held it above her head, looking upward for the picture. It was gone; a stained place upon the paper marked the spot it had occupied, and that was all.
The candle dropped from Elsie’s hand, which was still uplifted as if paralyzed.
“Gone! Oh, my soul, he has gone with her!”
These words were uttered in a feeble, heart-broken voice, and Elsie glided away through the darkness into her chamber. For days and weeks she did not speak again.