Aunt Sue was installed as supreme power in the sick-room. Grace's life hung by a thread for days, and before the doctor could be sure that all would be well the disquieting news of Joe Tobet's arrest came to disturb them still further.
Snow lay deep over everything before Grace came down among them, a pale wraith of a woman, but with a deepened sweetness of expectation in her face. They feared to tell her of Joe's predicament, but knew afterward that it would have been better to do so; for she was to discover it in one of those unforeseen, brutal ways that so often accompany the disasters of the poor. One day a shivering small boy brought a note to the back door, and Grace herself happened to be the one to take it in. It would have been less cruel to give her a coal of living fire.
The folded paper was soiled, as if it had been passed from hand to hand. Its pencilled words were:
"You or she told Youl be got even with Curs you JOE."
Grace waited to speak of it until the doctor came. Then her dignity of manner was a revelation to Rosamund, who had yet to discover that elemental passions can sometimes be as silent as the ages that create them.
Grace looked unfalteringly at Ogilvie as she spoke. "Where have they got Joe?" she asked.
Rosamund exclaimed, and motioned to him not to reply; but he was wiser than she. His answer, as simple and direct as her question, gave no evidence of surprise. "In the city. The jail is stronger there."
"Will they let him out?"
"The evidence may not be enough to hold him. He is awaiting trial."
"Will we know if they let him out?"