nine months old she died, with the little one folded to her bosom,
just as Hester Hamilton had held it when she too passed from earth.

"Doubly blessed," whispered old Hagar, who was present, and then when
she remembered that to poor little Hester a mother's blessing would
never be given she felt that her load of guilt was greater than she
could bear. "She will perhaps forgive me if I confess it to her
over Miss Margaret's coffin," she thought; and once when they stood
together by the sleeping dead, and Madam Conway, with Maggie in her
arms, was bidding the child kiss the clay-cold lips of its mother, old
Hagar attempted to tell her. "Could you bear Miss Margaret's death as
well," she said, "if Maggie, instead of being bright and playful
as she is, were weak and sick like Hester?" and her eyes fastened
themselves upon Madam Conway with an agonizing intensity which that
lady could not fathom. "Say, would you bear it as well--could you love
her as much--would you change with me, take Hester for your own, and
give me little Maggie?" she persisted, and Madam Conway, surprised
at her excited manner, which she attributed in a measure to envy,
answered coldly: "Of course not. Still, if God had seen fit to give me
a child like Hester, I should try to be reconciled, but I am thankful
he has not thus dealt with me."

"'Tis enough. I am satisfied," thought Hagar. "She would not thank me
for telling her. The secret shall be kept;" and half exultingly she
anticipated the pride she should feel in seeing her granddaughter
grown up a lady and an heiress.

Anon, however, there came stealing over her a feeling of remorse, as
she reflected that the child defrauded of its birthright would, if it
lived, be compelled to serve in the capacity of a servant; and many a