There was no tremor in Arthur's voice, and Nina little guessed how much it cost him thus to speak, with Edith sitting near. Looking up into his face with a startled, perplexed expression, she said, "I did not expect this, Arthur boy. I thought you loved Miggie." "Nina, please don't," and Edith spoke entreatingly, but Nina answered pettishly, "I ain't going to please, for everything has got upside down. It's all going wrong, and it won't make a speck of difference, as I see, whether I die or not." "I think I'd try to live then," Arthur said, laughingly, while Edith hailed the appearance of Marie as something which would put a restraint upon Nina. It had been arranged that Edith should take Arthur's place in the sick room that night, but Nina suddenly changed her mind, insisting that Arthur should sleep there as usual. "There's a heap of things I must tell you," she whispered to him; "and my head is clearer when it's darker and the candles are on the stand." So Edith retired to her own room, and after a time Arthur was alone with Nina. He was very tired, but at her request he sat down beside her, where she could look into his face and see, as she said, if he answered her for true. At first it was of herself she spoke--herself, as she used to be. "I remember so well," she said "when you called me your Florida rose, and asked for one of my curls. That was long ago, and there have been years of darkness since, but the clouds are breaking now--daylight is coming up, or rather Nina is going out, into the daylight, where there is no more buzzing, no more headache. Will I be crazy in Heaven, think?" "No, darling, no," and Arthur changed his seat from the chair to the bed, where he could be nearer to the little girl, who continued, "I've thought these many weeks how good you've been to me--how happy you have made my last days, while I have been so bad to you, but you musn't remember it against me, Arthur boy, when I'm dead and there isn't any naughty Nina anywhere, neither at the Asylum, nor Grassy Spring, nor here in bed, nothing but a teenty grave, out in the yard, with the flowers growing on it, I say you must not remember the wicked things I've done, for it wasn't the Nina who talks to you now. It was the buzzing Nina who tore your hair, and scratched your face, and bit your arm. Oh, Arthur, Nina's so sorry now; but you musn't lay it up against me." "No, my darling, God forbid that I, who have wronged you so terribly, should remember aught against you," and Arthur kissed the slender hands which had done him so much mischief. They were harmless now, those little waxen hands, and they caressed Arthur's face and hair as Nina went on.