sometimes happen without any apparent cause, and she saw Una come into
the room. She had a little purse of embroidery--her own work--in her
hand; and she stole lightly to the bedside, with her peculiar oblique
smile, and evidently thinking that her sister was asleep.

Alice was thrilled with a strange terror, and did not speak or move; and
her sister slipped her hand softly under her bolster, and withdrew it.
Then Una stood for while by the hearth, and stretched her hand up to the
mantelpiece, from which she took a little bit of chalk, and Alice
thought she saw her place it in the fingers of a long yellow hand that
was stealthily introduced from her own chamber-door to receive it; and
Una paused in the dark recess of the door, and smiled over her shoulder
toward her sister, and then glided into her room, closing the doors.

Almost freezing with terror, Alice rose and glided after her, and stood
in her chamber, screaming----

"Una, Una, in heaven's name what troubles you?"

But Una seemed to have been sound asleep in her bed, and raised herself
with a start, and looking upon her with a peevish surprise, said----

"What does Alice seek here?"

"You were in my room, Una, dear; you seem disturbed and troubled."

"Dreams, Alice. My dreams crossing your brain; only dreams--dreams. Get
you to bed, and sleep."

And to bed she went, but _not_ to sleep. She lay awake more than an