toward the door. "Neither my sister nor myself will remain beneath the
same roof which shelters you. To-morrow we leave, knowing well that
vengeance belongeth to One higher than we."

All the remainder of that day Walter and Margaret spent in devising
some plan for the future, deciding at last that Margaret should on the
morrow go for a time to Mrs. Kirby's, while Walter returned to the
city. The next morning, however, Walter did not appear in the
breakfast parlor, and when Margaret, alarmed at his absence, repaired
to his room, she found him unable to rise. The fever with which his
father had died, and which, was still prevailing in the village, had
fastened upon him, and for many days was his life despaired of. The
ablest physicians were called, but few of them gave any hope to the
pale, weeping sister, who, with untiring love, kept her vigils by her
brother's bedside.

When he was first taken ill he had manifested great uneasiness at his
stepmother's presence, and when at last he became delirious he no
longer concealed his feelings, and if she entered the room he would
shriek "Take her away from me! Take her away! Chain her in the
cellar--anywhere out of my sight."

Again he would speak of Kate, and entreat that she might come to him.
"I have nothing left but her and Margaret," he would say; "and why
does she stay away?"

Three different times had Margaret sent to her young friend, urging
her to come, and still she tarried, while Margaret marveled greatly
at the delay. She did not know that the girl whom she had told to go
had received different directions from Mrs. Hamilton, and that each