And their fears were right, for many of those who visited them on the
night of which we have spoken, disbelieved the tale, mentally
pronouncing the clergyman's letter a forgery, got up by Helena to
deceive her parents. Consequently, of the few who from time to time
came to the old farmhouse, nearly all were actuated by motives of
curiosity, rather than by feelings of pity for the young girl-mother,
who, though feeling their neglect, scarcely heeded it. Strong in the
knowledge of her own innocence, she lay day after day, watching and
waiting for one who never came. But at last, as days glided into
weeks, and weeks into months, hope died away, and turning wearily
upon her pillow, she prayed that she might die; and when the days
grew bright and gladsome in the warm spring sun, when the snow was
melted from off the mountain tops, and the first robin's note was
heard by the farmhouse door, Helena laid her baby on her mother's
bosom, and without a murmur glided down the dark, broad river, whose
deep waters move onward and onward, but never return.

When it was known in Oakland that Helena was dead, there came a
reaction, and those who had been loudest in their condemnation, were
now the first to hasten forward with offers of kindness and words of
sympathy. But neither tears nor regrets could recall to life the
fair young girl, who, wondrously beautiful even in death, slept
calmly in her narrow coffin, a smile of sadness wreathing her lips,
as if her last prayer had been for one who had robbed her thus early
of happiness and life. In the bright green valley at the foot of the
mountain, they buried her, and the old father, as he saw the damp
earth fall upon her grave, asked that he too might die. But his
wife, younger by several years, prayed to live--live that she might
protect and care for the little orphan, who first by its young
mother's tears, and again by the waters of the baptismal fountain,