so near to her that she might have touched the one who wept by
putting out her hand.

Elsalill sat listening to the sighing and sobbing, and thought to
herself that she had never heard so sorrowful a sound.

"Who is it that is afflicted with such deep grief that she must
shed these bitter tears?" thought Elsalill.

She looked behind her, and she leaned forward over the next pew to
see. But all were sitting in silence, and no face was wet with
tears.

Then Elsalill thought there was no need to ask or wonder, for
indeed she had known from the first who it was that wept beside
her. "Dear sister," she whispered, "why do you not show yourself
to me, as you did but lately? For you must know that I would
gladly do all I may to dry your tears."

She listened for an answer, but none came. All she heard was the
sobbing of the dead girl beside her.

Elsalill tried to hearken to what the preacher was saying in the
pulpit, but she could follow little of it. And she grew impatient
and whispered: "I know one who has more cause to weep than any,
and that is myself. Had not my foster sister revealed her murderer
to me I might have sat here with a heart full of joy."

As she listened to the weeping she became more and more resentful,
so that she thought: "How can my dead foster sister require of me