out of her father's room.

"You have done it?" she said, as her stepmother, trembling with agitation
and weariness, came towards her. "You have gone back to them?"

"Oh, Laura! I had to follow the call--my conscience--Laura! oh! your poor
father!"

And with a burst of weeping the widow held out her hands.

Laura did not move, and the hands dropped.

"My father wants nothing," she said.

The indescribable pride and passion of her accent cowed Augustina, and
she moved away, crying silently. The girl went back to the dead, and sat
beside him, in an anguish that had no more tears, till he was taken from
her.

Mr. Helbeck wrote kindly to his sister in reply to a letter from her
informing him of her husband's death, and of her own reconciliation with
the Church. He asked whether he should come at once to help them through
the business of the funeral, and the winding up of their Cambridge life.
"Beg him, please, to stay away," said Laura, when the letter was shown
her. "There are plenty of people here."

And indeed Cambridge, which had taken little notice of the Fountains
during Stephen's lifetime, was even fussily kind after his death to his
widow and child. It was at all times difficult to be kind to Laura in
distress, but there was much true pity felt for her, and a good deal of