Rejoicing to hear her speak so rationally, though wondering if what she said of Helen was not the imagining of a disordered brain, he began to examine the pieces of the wheel, and found that with the exertion of a little skill he could put them together again, and that it was only some slender parts of the machine which were broken. He placed the money in its hollow receptacles, united the brazen rings, and smoothed the tangled flax that twined the distaff. Ever and anon Miss Thusa turned her fading glance towards him, and murmured, "It is good. It is good!" For more than an hour she lay perfectly still, when suddenly moving, she exclaimed, "Put away the curtain--it's too dark." Arthur drew aside the curtain from the window nearest the bed, and the pale, cold moonlight came in, in white, shining bars, and striped the dark counterpane. One fell across Miss Thusa's face, and illuminated it with a strange and ghastly lustre. "Has the moon gone down?" she asked. "I thought it stayed till morning in the sky. But my glasses are getting wondrous dim. I must have a new pair, doctor. How slow the wheel turns round; the band keeps slipping off, and the crank goes creaking, creaking, for want of oil. Little Helen, take your feet off the treadle, and don't sit so close, darling. I can't breathe." She panted a few moments, catching her breath with difficulty, then tossing her arms above the bed-cover, said, in a fainter voice, "The great wheel of eternity keeps rolling on, and we are all bound upon it. How grandly it moves, and all the time the flax on the distaff is smoking. God says in the Bible He will not quench it, but blow it to a flame. You've read the Bible, havn't you, doctor? It is a powerful book. It tells about Moses and the Lamb. I'll tell you a story, Helen, about a Lamb that was slain. I've told you a great many, but never one like this. Come nearer, for I can't speak very loud. Take care, the thread is sliding off the spool. Cut it, doctor, cut it; it's winding round my heart so tight! Oh, my God! it snaps in two!" These were the last words the aged spinster ever uttered. The main-spring of life was broken. When the cold, gray light of morning had extinguished the pallid splendor of the moon, and one by one the objects in the little room came forth from the dimness of shade, which a single lamp had not power to disperse, a great change was visible. The dark covering of the bed was removed, the bed itself was gone--but through a snowy white sheet that was spread over the frame, the outline of a tall form was visible. All was silent as the grave. A woman sat by the hearth, with a grave and solemn countenance--so grave and so solemn she seemed a fixture in that still apartment. The wheel stood still by the bed-frame, the spectacles lay still on the Bible, and a dark, gray dress hung in still, dreary folds against the wall.