When, Amanda came back, she did not stay to unharness, but hurried up to the kitchen door, and called, "You all right, ma'am?" There was no answer, and she stepped hastily across the floor. As she opened the sitting-room door, a low moaning struck her ear. The old lady sat huddled together in, her chair, groaning at intervals, and looking fixedly at the corner of the room. "O ma'am, what is it? Where be you hurt?" cried Amanda, possessed by an anguish of self-reproach. But the old lady only continued her moaning; and then it was that Amanda noticed her shrivelled and shaking fingers tightly clasped upon a roll of money in her lap. "Why, ma'am, what you got?" she cried; but even as she spoke, the explanation flashed upon her, and she looked up at the corner of the room. The eight-day clock was gone. "Here, ma'am, you let me have it," she said, soothingly; and by dint of further coaxing, she pulled the money from the old lady's tense fingers. There were nine dollars in crisp new bills. Amanda sat looking at them in unbelief and misery. "O my!" she whispered, at length, "what a world this is! Ma'am, did you tell him he might have 'em?" "I dunno what Jonathan'll do without that clock," moaned the old lady. "I see it carried off myself." "Did you tell him he might?" cried Amanda, loudly. "I dunno but I did, but I never'd ha' thought he'd ha' done it. I dunno what time 'tis now;" and she continued her low-voiced lamenting. "O my Lord!" uttered Amanda, under her breath. Then she roused herself to the present exigency of comfort. "You come an' set in the kitchen a spell," she said, coaxingly, "an' I'll go an' get the things back." Old Lady Green looked at her with that unquestioning trust which was the most pathetic accompaniment of her state. "You'll git 'em back, 'Mandy, won't ye?" she repeated, smiling a little and wiping her eyes. "That's a good gal! So't we can tell what time 'tis." Amanda led her into the kitchen, and established her by the window. She shut the door of the denuded sitting-room, and, giving her courage no time to cool, ran across lots to the Blaisdells', the hated money clasped tightly in her hand. The family was at supper, and the stranger with them, when she walked in at the kitchen door. She hurried up to her enemy, and laid the little roll of bills by his plate. Her cheeks were scarlet, her thin hair-flying. "Here's your money," she said, in a strained, high voice, "an' I want our things. You hadn't ought to gone over there an' talked over an old lady that--that--" There she stopped. Amanda had never yet acknowledged that her mother was not in her "perfect mind." Chapman took out a long pocket-book, and for a moment her courage stood at flood-tide; she thought he was about to accept the money and put it away. But no! He produced a slip of white paper and held it up before her. She bent forward and examined it,--a receipt signed by her mother's shaking hand.