Haldon was the name of the people to whom the house belonged. Jem
Foster had heard only the vaguest things of them, but Jane
remembered that the name was Haldon, and remembering that they
had gone away because they had had trouble, she recognized at a
glance what sort of trouble it had been. Mrs. Haldon was tall and
young, and to Jane Foster's mind, expressed from head to foot the
perfection of all that spoke for wealth and fashion. Her garments
were heavy and rich with crape, the long black veil, which she
had thrown back, swept over her shoulder and hung behind her,
serving to set forth, as it were, more pitifully the white
wornness of her pretty face, and a sort of haunting eagerness in
her haggard eyes. She had been a smart, lovely, laughing and
lovable thing, full of pleasure in the world, and now she was so
stricken and devastated that she seemed set apart in an awful
lonely world of her own.

She had no sooner crossed the threshold than she looked about her
with a quick, smitten glance and began to tremble. Jane saw her
look shudder away from the open door of the front room, where the
chairs had seemed left as if set for some gathering, and the
wax-white flowers had been scattered on the floor.

She fell into one of the carved hall seats and dropped her face
into her hands, her elbows resting on her knees.

"Oh! No! No!" she cried. "I can't believe it. I can't believe
it!"

Jane Foster's eyes filled with good-natured ready tears of
sympathy.