caught by the fierce north wind, which had begun to sweep the hill, and
was borne along till it reached the ears of a woman who was sitting
sewing in a cottage some fifty yards further up the lane. She stepped to
her door, opened it and listened.

'It's at Bessie's,' she said; 'whativer's wrong wi' the childer?'

By this time Arthur had begun to run towards her. Darkness was falling
rapidly, but she could distinguish his small figure against the snow,
and his halting gait.

'What is it, Arthur?--what is it, lammie?'

'O Cousin Mary Anne! Cousin Mary Anne! It's Uncle John, an 'ee's dead!'

She ran like the wind at the words, catching at the child's hand in the
dark, and dragging him along with her.

'Where is he, Arthur?--don't take on, honey!'

The child hurried on with her, sobbing, and she was soon on the stairs
beside the unconscious John.

Mary Anne looked with amazement at the cupboard and the open box. Then
she laid the old man on the floor, her gentle face working with the
effort to remember what the doctor had once told her of the best way of
dealing with persons in a faint. She got water, and she sent Arthur to a
neighbour for brandy.

'Where's your mother, child?' she asked, as she dispatched him.