A phantom shape had been pursuing Margaret De Jarnette for months--a specter of evil form and visage. It had given her just a glimpse of itself now and then; it was quick to hide behind more agreeable forms and she was always glad to lose it; then she would forget it until some day it would start up before her like a grinning death's head for a brief second and again disappear. She had eluded it. She had denied its existence even to herself, but she knew now that she had feared it from the first and refused to face it. To-day it had taken bodily shape and grappled with her. It was through Mammy Cely that the incarnation came. Margaret had been talking to the old woman as she often did about the case in court, its long delay, and finally the bill and the relief which that promised even if the case in court failed. "Miss Margaret," said Mammy Cely, not looking at her, but speaking in a voice of great compassionateness, "is you sho' that bill gwineter he'p you?" "Why, certainly!" Margaret answered as she had answered Mrs. Pennybacker when she had asked the same foolish question (it was at such times that the specter rose before her), "It will give me Philip." Mammy Cely still looked away. "Marse Richard 'low that bill don't have nothin' 't all to do with Philip. Maybe he don't know," she added, but rather doubtfully, for she had boundless confidence in Richard's knowledge. "He certainly does not know," said Margaret sharply. "How did you happen to be talking to him about it?" "I jes' accidently mentioned that you was layin' off to take Philip as soon as the bill passed, and he 'low the bill didn't have no bearin' on the case. He say it can't ondo a thing that was done years ago." Margaret felt that she had received a blow. A sudden recollection of Senator Black's words flashed upon her and she grew so white that Mammy Cely prudently refrained from any more discussion of the subject. She might have told her how in the goodness of her heart she had gone to Mr. De Jarnette, hoping to stir pity in his breast, and said, "Marse Richard, do you reckon that po' chile gwineter live ef this here bill givin' her Philip don't pass?" and how he had answered her in shocked amazement, "Giving her Philip! Great heavens, you don't tell me she is expecting that?" He really looked so concerned that it seemed to Mammy Cely as if the emotion she had been trying to fan into flame flared up for a moment, but it and her hope went out together as he added coldly, "If that is what she is working for, she might as well give it up. That bill couldn't undo what was done years ago." She did not tell Margaret all this, however, contenting herself with repeating, "No 'm, he say it don't have no bearin' on the case." "It is false!" cried Margaret, with vehement iteration. "He'll find that it will have some bearing on the case before we are through."