thought as it might be no more than a dream. I had a many dreams
while I were lying on that little bed in grandmother's room, wicked
dreams, and this might be one of them; and yet it's real-like, and
there isn't the muddle in it that there is in the other dreams.'

'What is it, Peter? O, pray, pray be quick!'

'I'm a-coming to it, miss. Is it wicked for folks to kill
theirselves?'

'Is it wicked? Of course it is--desperately wicked; a sin that can
never be repented of.'

'Then I know one that's going to do it.'

'Who?'

'Mrs. Darrell.'

He gave a solemn nod, and stood staring at me with wide-open awe-
stricken eyes.

'How do you know that?'

'It was one dark night, when it was raining hard--I could hear it
drip, drip, drip upon the roof just over where I was lying. It was
when I was very bad, and lay still all day and couldn't speak. But I
knew what grandmother said to me, and I knew everything that was
going on, though I didn't seem to--that was the curious part of it. I
had been asleep for a bit, and I woke up all of a sudden, and heard