A dry sob choked her; she gasped for breath. Emma, fearful lest the very life was escaping from her embrace, drew away and looked in anguish. Her involuntary tears had ceased, but she could no longer practise deception. The cost to Jane was greater perhaps than if she knew the truth. At least their souls must be united ere it was too late. ‘The truth, Emmy!’ ‘I will tell it you, darling,’ she replied, with quiet sadness. ‘It’s for him that I’m sorry. I never thought anything could tempt him to break his word. Think of it in the same way as I do, dear-sister; don’t be sorry for me, but for him.’ ‘He’s never coming? He won’t marry you?’ ‘He’s already married, Jane. Alice came to tell me.’ Again she would have raised herself, but this time there was no strength. Not even her arms could she lift from the coverlets. But Emma saw the vain effort, raised the thin arms, put them about her neck, and held her sister to her heart as if for eternity. ‘Darling, darling, it isn’t hard to bear. I care for nothing but your love. Live for my sake, dearest dear; I have forgotten every one and everything but you. It’s so much better. I couldn’t have changed my life so; I was never meant to be rich. It seems unkind of him, but in a little time we shall see it was best. Only you, Janey; you have my whole heart, and I’m so glad to feel it is so. Live, and I’ll give every minute of my life to loving you, poor sufferer.’ Jane could not breathe sound into the words she would have spoken. She lay with her eyes watching the fire-play on the ceiling. Her respiration was quick and feeble. Mutimer’s name was not mentioned by either again that night, by one of them never again. Such silence was his punishment. Kate entered the room a little before midnight. She saw one of Jane’s hands raised to impose silence. Emma, still sitting by the bedside, slept; her head rested on the pillows. The sick had become the watcher. ‘She’d better go to bed,’ Kate whispered. ‘I’ll wake her.’ ‘No, no You needn’t stay, Kate. I don’t want anything. Let her sleep as she is.’ The elder sister left the room. Then Jane approached her head to that of the sleeper, softly, softly, and her arm stole across Emma’s bosom and rested on her farther shoulder. The fire burned with little whispering tongues of flame; the circles of light and shade quivered above the lamp. Abroad the snow fell and froze upon the ground. Three days later Alice Mutimer, as she sat at breakfast, was told that a visitor named Mrs. Clay desired to see her. It was nearly ten o’clock; Alice had no passion for early rising, and since her mother’s retirement from the common table she breakfasted alone at any hour which seemed good to her. ‘Arry always--or nearly always--left the house at eight o’clock. Mrs. Clay was introduced into the dining-room. Alice received her with an anxious face, for she was anticipating trouble from the house in Wilton Square. But the trouble was other than she had in mind.