Amy controlled herself with an effort, and rising from her knees, sat down on the edge of the bed, still holding Kate's hand, while she assisted Mother Gray to soothe her.
When she grew more quiet, Amy said, "We must send for your father and mother at once; they can—"
"No, no, you must not—you shall not—they do not know—in mercy, don't tell them—it would kill them. Promise; oh promise me you will never tell them how I died. In pity for them, promise me."
Mother Gray bowed her gray head, while the tears streamed down her wrinkled cheeks. "Yes, yes, dearie, we'll promise. It's better that they do not know until it's all over; and they need never know all." And whispering to Amy, she added, "The poor child can't last but a little longer."
Reassured, the sufferer sank back again with a long sigh, and closed her eyes wearily, but a moment later, opened them once more to look at Amy.
"I'm so glad you're here," she said feebly; "but I can't bear to have you think that I am all bad." And then in whispered, halting words, with many a break and pause, she told her story; a story all too common. And Amy, listening with white horror-stricken face, guessed that which Mother Gray could not know, and which the sufferer tried to conceal, the name of her betrayer.
"And so we were married in secret, or I thought we were," she concluded. "I know now that it was only a farce. He came to visit me twice after the sham ceremony that betrayed me, and I never saw him again until last night. Oh God, forgive him; forgive him, I—I loved him so."
The poor wronged creature burst into a fit of passionate sobbing that could not be controlled. In vain did Mother Gray try to soothe her. It was of no use. Until at last, exhausted, she sank again into a stupor, from which she roused only once near morning, and then she whispered simply, "Good-bye Mother; Goodbye Miss Amy. Don't let father know." And just as the day dawned in all its glory, her soul, pure and unstained as that of her babe, took its flight, and the smile of innocent girlhood was upon her lips.
When Amy reached home early in the forenoon, she met her brother in the hallway, just going out.
"You look like you'd been making a night of it," he said, with a contemptuous sneer. "Been consoling some wanderer I suppose."