Rachel re-entered the shop, and again sat down, resolved to be patient; but her nervous restlessness soon became intolerable. Seized with an indefinite fear, she rose, took the light, and entered the parlour: it was vacant. Passing under a low door which she found ajar, she went up a dark staircase. It ended with a narrow landing, and a solitary door; she knocked, and got no reply; she tried it, it yielded to her hand, and opened; but Rachel did not cross the threshold; she paused upon it, awe-struck at the sight she saw. The room was a small one, poorly famished, with a low and narrow bed, a table and a few chairs. On the mantle-shelf burned a tallow light, dim and lurid for want of snuffing; its dull glow fell on the motionless figure of Thomas Gray. He sat straight and stiff in a wooden chair, with a hand resting on each arm. His face was ghastly pale, and rigid as death; his eyes stared on the blank wall before him, and seemed void of sight. "My father is dead," thought Rachel. She entered the room and went up to him. But when she laid her hand on his arm, a slight convulsive motion showed her that he still lived. Ay, he lived, of that living death, which is worse than the true. Paralysis had fallen upon him without warning. Like a thief in the night it had come; and in a few brief seconds it had laid low the proud man's strength. Of that strength he had boasted in the morning; twelve hours had not gone round--where was it now? Rachel did not lose her presence of mind. How she went out, found a doctor, and brought him back, she never exactly knew; but she did it. The medical man looked at Thomas Gray, then at Rachel. "You are his daughter," he said, kindly. "Yes, sir, I am." "Well, then, my poor girl, I am very sorry for you--very sorry. Your father may live years but I can hold out no prospect of recovery." "None, sir?" faltered Rachel, looking wistfully in his face. "Not the least. Better I should tell you so at once, than deceive you." But Rachel would not--could not believe him. The sentence was too hard, too pitiless to be true. "Father, father! do you know me?" she cried. He stared vacantly in her face. Did he know her? Perhaps he did. Who can tell how far the spirit lived in that dead body? But if know her he did, gone was the time when he could hold intercourse with that long slighted, and now bitterly avenged daughter. In vain she clung weeping around his neck, in vain she called on him to reply. He merely looked at her in the same vacant way, and said childishly, "Never mind." "But you know me--you know me, father!" said Rachel. Again, he looked at her vacantly, and still the only words he uttered were, "Never mind." "His mind is gone for ever," said the doctor.