“Woman,” said the old man, and this time his voice was firm, and thrillingly solemn; “you have no heart. You are a mother, and should know how much worse than death it is to see the child whom you have loved and cherished, and woven in your very heart-strings, perishing before your eyes. Oh, how proud we were of that boy! how his poor mother loved him! what a day it was when she and I walked up the broad aisle of that old meeting-house yonder, and saw him standing in the pulpit—a minister of the gospel. We had prayed for that sight—toiled and slaved for it—and were so happy—so very happy. He is on his death bed now. Woman, _you_ have sent him there—you, who were a mother, thought nothing of smiting a sister woman through the heart—you, a professor of religion, can do murder more subtle and cruel than that which cleaves a man through the brain, and look calm and speak softly, nay, smilingly refuse the last dying request of your victim. Woman, I will not curse you—that right rests with the high God of Heaven, who looketh down upon the murder you have done, not as man looketh, not as the law looketh—before _him_, shall you be arraigned, and that cold heart shall be made to shudder at the depth of its own crime—_he_ will be thine accuser—he, thy victim, who was so gentle, so sweet tempered, that thoughts of revenge never entered his heart. In a few short hours he will stand in the broad light of Heaven, sent there untimely; and even as Abel bear witness against his brother, he shall bear witness against thee! The Almighty may not place his mark upon thy brow—the law may not brand thee—but one who can wring the life from a human being by silent and moral cruelty, is not less a murderer than the man who smites his brother to the heart with a poniard!” Mrs. Gray was at length moved—for the solemn and stern energy of that pale old man might have startled the dead from their graves—the knitting dropped from her hands, her eyes darkled with terror, and her face turned white as a corpse beneath the snowy lace and the black and false hair that shaded it. She would have spoken, but the pallid lips trembled without uttering a sound, while the hands which rested in her lap began to shiver, as she strove to lift them and motion him away. The old man left her where she sat, and went into the hall; but his feelings had been too cruelly outraged, and there his strength gave way; he sunk helplessly to a settee, and covering his face with his hands, wept like a child. Malina had left the hall and stood in her sister’s chamber. Phebe was dressed and seated by the window, pondering over the pages of a book, though she had not turned a leaf that day. She did not raise her eyes when the door opened, but seemed unconscious of a second person. “Come with me,” said Malina, grasping the hand which lay in her sister’s lap, with fingers that clung to it like ice. “Come!”