"Your affectionate brother, dear Rose,
"F. Darling."
"What news for Adeline! Get out of the way, Mary Carr."
"Rose," said Miss Carr, in a tone of remonstrance, "it will not do to tell her."
"Not tell her!" exclaimed Rose.
"She is resigned and quiet now. Let her die in peace. News of him will only excite and disturb her."
"Don't talk to me! Let me go!" for Mary had laid hold of her dress to detain her.
"Rose, you are doing very wrong. She is almost in the last agony. Earthly hopes and interests have flitted away."
"You don't understand these things," rejoined Rose, with a curl upon her lip--"how should you? Has she not for months been yearning to see him--has not the pain of his cold neglect, his silence, his absence, hastened her to the grave--and, now that he is coming, you would keep it from her? Why, I tell you, Mary Carr, it will soothe her heart in dying."
She broke away impetuously, and went into the bed-chamber. Adeline unclosed her eyes at her approach. What Rose said, as she leaned over her and whispered, Mary Carr could not hear; but even in that last hour, it brought the red hectic to her faded cheek. How wildly and eagerly she looked up!