Next moment a great cry rang through the silent house--the windows were thrown open, the bells rung, the maids rushed in, half frantic with excitement; what was it? A dreadful interval followed while they crowded about the bed, and while aunty, moaning, weeping, calling upon Amanda, tried to raise the senseless figure, to bring back animation by all the means which she had so often used before. The wild yet subdued bustle of such a terrible domestic incident, the hurried sending for the doctor, the running hither and thither for remedies, the strange dream-like horror of that one unresponsive, unmoving figure in the midst of all this tumult of anxious but bootless effort--how can I describe it? The cold night air poured into the room, ineffectually summoned to give breath to the lips that could draw breath no longer, and waved the lights about like things distracted, and chilled the living to the bone, as they ran to and fro, seeking this and that, making one vain effort after another. Innocent stood behind, leaning against the wall, like a marble image. She had been pushed aside by the anxious women. She stood with her eyes fixed on the bed, with a vague horror on her face. It was a dream to her, which had begun in her sleep; was she sleeping still? or was this a horrible reality? or what had she to do with it? she, a little while ago the chief actor, now the spectator, helpless, knowing nothing, yet with a chill of dread gnawing at her, like the fox in the fable, gnawing her heart. Innocent’s head seemed to turn round and round, as the strange group which had swept in, made all those wild circles round the bed, doing one strange thing after another, incoherent to her--moving and rustling, and talking low under the disturbed waving of the lights, and in the shadow of the curtains. When, after a long terrible interval, these figures dispersed, and one alone remained, throwing itself upon the bed in wild weeping, the girl roused herself. “What is it?” she asked, drawing a step nearer. “What is it?” It seemed to Innocent that something held her, that she could not look at the figure in the bed. “Oh, my darling! my darling! I have nursed her from a baby--she never was but good to me. Oh, my child, my ’Manda! Will you never speak to me again! Oh, ’Manda, my darling! Oh, my lovely angel!” Thus poor aunty moaned and wept. “What is it?” cried Innocent, with a voice which took authority from absolute despair. “Oh, can’t you see for yourself? It’s you as has done it, driving that angel wild. She’s dead! Oh, merciful Heaven, she’s dead----”