The housekeeper was sobbing quietly.
Chris looked at her. "Where's—my wife?" he asked in a whisper.
She shook her head.
"I don't know, sir; she went out almost directly after breakfast. Oh—the poor lamb, it will break her heart."
When Chris turned away, she followed him on to the Landing. She was carrying a big white woolly shawl over her arm.
Chris touched it. "Was she still working?" he asked. He knew it was 282 the shawl without which he had hardly ever seen Miss Chester.
The woman broke into fresh tears. She held the shawl up for his inspection.
"It's finished, sir! She must have put the last stitch into it just before she died, because Greyson said she was sitting up working at it when she called her this morning. She was so anxious to get it made—she always told me it was for Marie—for . . ."
"That will do," said Chris. He went downstairs and waited about till the doctor came down.
"There was nothing to be done," the doctor told him. "If I had been sitting beside her when it happened I could not have done anything." He looked at Chris' pale face sympathetically. "It's been a shock to you," he said. "And your wife—I am afraid she will feel it very much."