I think if I hadn't been able to cry, I must have fainted again; but I found myself the next moment sobbing most dreadfully, not able to stop, and holding on to the foot of the bed, not able to stand alone. Mother didn't stir, nor show any pity. She only kept her eyes fixed in that cold stare. But my sobbing woke up Mrs. Hammond, and she bustled across into mother's room in no time. "Dear, dear, dear me!" says she, in a fluster, and half-vexed. "Kitty, whatever are you after?" says she; "coming in here, and you wasn't to leave your bed! Why, Mrs. Phrynne, you don't mean to say you're up and dressed still, and it's two o'clock in the morning. So particular as I begged you to make haste into bed!—now, didn't I? I don't know whatever in the world Mr. Baitson 'll say to me, that I don't," says she. "Take that girl away," says mother, stern-like. "Take Kitty away! Why, so I will," says Mrs. Hammond. "Poor little Kitty! she isn't fit to be up, I'm sure—nor you neither, for the matter of that. Come, you'll make haste into bed now, won't you? And Kitty's going to get to sleep again. Give her a kiss now before she goes, won't you, Mrs. Phrynne?" But mother said "No!" as hard as could be, and turned her head away. I didn't know how to bear it. I threw myself down on the floor at her feet, and I cried in a sort of shriek, "O mother, mother, forgive me! O mother, love me!" But she wouldn't say one word, and only pushed her chair farther back out of my reach. Mrs. Hammond pulled me up, and got me somehow across the passage, pretty near carrying me, I think. "It's no manner of use talking to your mother," says she. "Don't you see she isn't her proper self? The shock's turned her brain, I do believe; and she won't have nothing to do with you yet. I don't know whatever Mr. Baitson 'll say to me if I don't get her into bed, and she's as obstinate as a mule; but I've got to go and try again. She wouldn't let me stay before, and I'm sure I'd no notion I was going to drop to sleep. Dear, dear me, it's a terrible state of things. Now you just lie still, Kitty, and don't you worry about your mother. She'll be better soon, I make no doubt." I lay still, as I was told, for I was past doing anything else; but as for not worrying—well, I suppose Mrs. Hammond didn't really mean it. She had to say something, and that did as well as anything else. Worry is hardly the word either. It was so much deeper than "worry." I had no more sleep that night. Was it likely I should? The blow that had fallen seemed too dreadful to be borne. My father, my kind gentle good father, gone from us in one moment, without warning, without good-bye! And to think that the last days of his life had been darkened and embittered by my ill-conduct and deceit! If it hadn't been for those last words, and that last kiss of forgiveness, I think I must have died of remorse. The pain would have been more than I could bear.