The clock in the kitchen struck in its surprised, alarmed way. How well Donelle remembered! The sun edged in through the east window, and found the little group by the cold stove. Then Jo awoke. She did not move, she only looked! She could not make it out, and gave an impatient exclamation. She felt that her mind was betraying her. "Donelle!" she said presently, "what does this mean?" "Only that I—I have come, Mamsey." "Tell me everything." The words were stern. "Why, Mamsey, there isn’t much to tell—except—that I’m here." "How did you get here?" "I—I walked. I walked all night." "And Mrs. Lindsay, she knows?" "Oh! no, Mamsey, she was away, but I left a note. I had to come Mamsey, I had to. You see," brightly, piteously, "I—I couldn’t play my fiddle. It would not be played. When I got to thinking of how it would be out where I was going, I just couldn’t! The pretty dresses and the—the excitement made me forget for a little time, but all of a sudden I saw how it was going to be. Then I tried to play, and I couldn’t! Then I knew that I must stay, because more than anything, Mamsey, I wanted—you!" "This is sheer nonsense!" said Jo, but her voice shook, and the hand lying against Donelle’s cheek trembled. "You mad child! Why, Donelle, don’t you see you are running away from your life?" "It will have to find me here, then, Mamsey. Don’t send me away. I would hate it as I would have hated St. Michael’s if you had sent me back there. You see, Mamsey, when I run away I always run to what is really mine. Don’t you see?" "Are you sick, child?" Jo felt, now, the uplifted face. "No, but I would have been, off there! And I couldn’t play. What good would anything have been, if I couldn’t play?" Jo was thoroughly alarmed. "Can you play here?" she asked, bewildered, not knowing what to think, but seeking to calm the girl on the floor. "Why, Mamsey, let me try!" And Donelle tried, rising stiffly, fixing the violin and raising the bow. A moment of indecision, of fear; then the radiance drove the haggard lines from the tired, white face. She could play! She walked about the plain home-room. She forgot Jo, forgot her troubles, she knew everything was all right now! The final answer had been given her! When she finished she stood before Jo, and Nick crept toward her. He, too, felt that something, which had been very wrong, was righted. Mrs. Lindsay came later. She was alarmed and angry. She and Jo attacked poor Donelle’s position and were indignant that they were obliged to do so; they, women and wise; she, a stubborn and helpless girl! "I couldn’t leave Mamsey," was her only reply, and she looked faint from struggle. "But Mam’selle does not want you!" Mrs. Lindsay said almost brutally, seeing that she had succeeded only too well in preserving this girl for Jo. "You have no right to become a burden, Donelle, when you have the opportunity of independence."