John stood still, spellbound. He could not move, nor believe his ears. And then his mother rose up, though she could scarcely stand. “Nobody calls me mamma but one,” she cried; “only Kate! Oh my good Lord, something has happened to Kate!” And then, all at once, the darkness stirred, and a little black figure formed itself out of the night, and glided into the window. Was it a ghost? was it she, killed by unkindness, come to pay them a visit on her way to heaven? The mother and son thought so for one dreadful moment. Her face was as pale as death; her dress all black as the night out of which she came. Mrs Mitford gave a wild shriek, of which she was not sensible, and fell back on her son, who held her, and gazed and gasped. But Kate did not think it strange. It was natural his mother should shrink from her, she thought, and she did not see John in the shadow. She was not thinking of John then. She came in with her little soft quiet step, and threw herself down at Mrs Mitford’s knee. “Yes, it is me,” she said; “it is Kate. Mamma, save me; oh take me in and save me! I have nobody to come to but you. They want me to be untrue to my John,” she cried, suddenly, with a shrill break in her voice; “and he has deserted me. Oh, mamma, whom can I come to but you?” John dropped his mother into her chair. He made one stride round the table, and clutched at the kneeling creature. He took her up in his arms like a child, and turned her wan face to him, holding it in his hand. He was almost rough with her in the anguish of his eagerness. “It is Kate,” he said, with an unintelligible cry, and kissed her, and burst out weeping with a great sound, which seemed to fill the whole house. “It is Kate!” raining down kisses upon her hair and her upturned face; and so stood with her little figure lifted in his arms, mad with the wonder and the misery and the joy--till suddenly the pale little face drooped unconscious, and she hung a dead weight on his arm. “I have killed her now,” he cried out, with a sharp voice of anguish, and stayed his kisses and sobs to look at her lying motionless upon his breast. “It is nothing; she has fainted,” cried Mrs Mitford, who had been slowly coming to herself, and whom this emergency fully roused. “Lay her down on the sofa; bring me some water; ring the bell. Oh my poor child! how she must have suffered! how pale she is! Don’t touch her, John; let her lie still. Oh Kate, call me mamma again, my darling! Softly, softly; take off her cloak. Water, Lizzie; and keep quiet. Now she will soon come to herself.”