“Still alive, but failing fast, and asking for Georgie,” Maude had said to him, and then he waited another hour and a half until the clock struck twelve. Georgie had said “come at two,” and so he went, and waited until the last carriage drove away, and then his hand was on the door before the tired servant could lock and bolt it. “Did you leave anything, sir?” the man asked, thinking Jack one of the recent guests. “No; I came for Miss Burton. Say her brother is here,” Jack replied; but before the message could be delivered Georgie was standing by him and had heard the message: “Alive, but dying very fast. You have no time to lose.” And Georgie lost none. Speeding upstairs to her room she caught up a long water-proof, and wrapping it around her, said to her astonished maid: “Tell mamma that Annie Heyford is dying; that my brother Jack came for me before the party, and I promised to go as soon as it was over. She must not be troubled about me. I shall come back or send some word in the morning.” “But your dress, Miss Burton! Surely, you will change that?” the girl said, thinking her young mistress demented. It was the first thought Georgie had given to her dress, and with a shudder, as she drew up the folds of her elegant costume, she answered: “I have not time to change it now. I told you she was dying.” And so with the diamonds glittering on her neck and arms and shining in her hair, Georgie went out to the carriage, where Jack put her in, his impatience and resentment beginning to subside when he saw the deep pallor of her face and the look of anguish in her eyes. Her head was uncovered, and the flowers she had worn were there still, but Jack drew the hood of her water-proof up over her hair, and adjusted it under her chin with a carefulness and gentleness which brought a gush of tears from Georgie, who had laid her head upon his shoulder, and said sobbingly: “You are kind, Jack; I don’t deserve that you should think of my comfort.” He did not reply, and the silence between them was not broken again until Jersey City was reached. There had been a delay at the ferry, and it was nearer four than three when Georgie stood at last by Annie’s bedside.