the old place would be warmed and lighted again, and she told this to
Aunt Janet, who was sitting, sunk in thought, by the fire in the
book-room.

"I wouldn't be dreaming too much, Marcella," she said gently. "Even if
dreams come true to some extent, they are very disappointing. A dream
that you dreamed in a golden glow comes to pass in a sort of grey
twilight, you know. And you'll never bring happiness here. Get the
thought out of your head. There are too many ghosts. Could you ever kill
the ghost of little Rose lying there with pain inside her, eating her
life out? Or your father raging and hungering, like a pine tree in a
window-pot?" She shook her head sadly. "No, Marcella, till you've killed
thought you'll never be happy--till you've killed feeling--"

"Look here," began Marcella quickly, kneeling beside her aunt and
suddenly holding her stiff body in her quick young arms. "Auntie," she
said, using the diminutive shyly, and even more shamefacedly adding,
"dear--I'm not going to listen to you. So there! I'm going away, and I'm
going to come back and simply _dose_ you with happiness, like we used to
dose the old mare with medicine when she was ill. If you won't take it,
I'll drown you in it. Or else what's the use of my going away?"

"You're going away because you feel it in your feet that you've got to
go, Marcella," said Aunt Janet calmly. The wind roared down the chimney
and sent fitful puffs of smoke out into the room. "If I tried to stop
you, you'd go on hungering to be away."