"Oh, Cara!" cried poor Faith, with tears in her eyes, "I don't know how I can be so selfish as to wish to leave you, but it is all true that he says. It was coming back to nurse you that put a stop to everything ten years ago; and now he has come back, and it seems as though we were meant for each other, and--and--" here she broke into nervous sobbing. "Pooh, pooh," returned the doctor, but his eyes glistened a little in sympathy; "Juniper Lodge is only next door, you are not going to be separated. Come, Miss Charity, you are a kind soul, and have courage enough for ten Faiths, say something comforting to your sister, to give her a good heart over this." Dr. Stewart knew how to treat Miss Charity. Underneath the sharpness and irritability there was the true metal of a good womanly nature, and a courage few women could boast. Years ago she had fought out her own battle, and had laid herself down on her bed of pain with a breaking heart but unmurmuring lips. Had she ever forgotten poor George since the day she had given him up? had she ever believed the stories they had brought her of his unworthiness? The small world of Hepshaw only saw in Miss Charity a little bright-eyed woman, with a caustic tongue and a temper soured by disappointment and suffering; but no one but Faith, and perhaps Dr. Stewart, knew what the martyred body and nerves bore day and night. "I feel sometimes like St. Lawrence on his gridiron; I wish it were a bed of roses to me too," she said once grimly to her sister; but not even to her did she speak of the slow agonies that consumed her. What would be the use, she thought; pain is sent to be borne, not to be talked about. Neither to Faith did she speak of the strange thoughts and dreams that haunted her nights. Sometimes, half lulled by opiates, it would seem to her as though the walls and roof of her chamber were thrown down; through the room rushed the cold winds of heaven; above her was the dark midnight sky seamed with glittering stars. How they wavered and shone! Voices sounded through them sometimes. Grey and white shadows moved hither and thither, silent, but with grave, speaking eyes pitying and full of love. "Poor Charity!" they seemed to say, "still fastened to the cross and waiting for the angel of peace and rest. Will he be long?" And the echo seemed to be caught up and passed on shuddering: "will he be long?" Ah, yes; those were her parents! and poor George, how plainly she could see him! He had died a drunkard's death they had told her, with a sorry attempt at comfort. He had ridden after a night's debauch, and his seat and hand had been unsteady; but she had shaken her head incredulously. What mattered how he died? he was at rest, she knew that, she was sure of it; he could not have sinned as they said he had--her poor George, on whom she had brought such misery!