She stood looking after him for a moment, and then made her way back to the ball-room mechanically. Another waltz had begun, and she hastily scanned the dancers for Paul's figure, but neither he nor Marjory were to be seen. Without an instant's hesitation she went to the conservatory, and found--what she knew she would find. "Excuse my interrupting you," she said, "but I have a message from Dr. Kennedy for Miss Carmichael. He has been called away for half an hour, but will be back then; and he hopes, my dear," she laid her hand on Marjory's arm affectionately, "that you will be ready for number ten. Meanwhile, Paul, you ought either to continue the lesson, or find Miss Carmichael another tutor. Ah! Major Bertie, have you found me! and I have turned the heel of my slipper and must go and put on another pair, but perhaps Miss Carmichael will console you." She waited till they had moved out of sight, and then turned to Paul, almost passionately: "And you--you are engaged for this dance, I presume?" "You presume a little too far, my dear Violet," he replied dangerously. "I am a helpless cripple, and I cannot run in harness, no matter how skilful the whip may be. If you are going back to the ball-room may I give you my one arm?" "No, thanks. I shall stay here." Never in their lives before had they come so near a quarrel, and, even though Mrs. Vane was wise enough to see the provocation which her own loss of temper had given him, the fact decided her. The change of slippers included other alterations in her toilette, and five minutes afterwards she was following Dr. Kennedy to Peggy Duncan's cottage. The walk was nothing on that warm September night, and the excuse of a desire to help sufficiently reasonable, her kindness in such ways being proverbial. Many a deathbed had been cheered by her cheerful aid, and yet, nerved as she was by experience, she shrank back at the sight which met her eyes as she lifted the latch of the cottage and entered. For the deep box bed, whereon old Peggy had passed so many years, had been inconvenient, and Dr. Kennedy had lifted her to the table, where she lay unconscious, looking like death itself, in the limp, powerless sinking into the pillow of her grey head. The old woman's dreary prophecy came back to Mrs. Vane, though this was not certain death, as yet; since, with his back towards her, his warm hands clasping those cold ones, his face bent on the watch for some sign of life, stood Dr. Kennedy, trying the last resource of artificial respiration. There is nothing in the whole range of experience more absorbing, more pathetic than this struggle of the living for the dying, whether it be for the new-born babe doubtful of existence, or, as here, for an old worn-out heart. And if it is so, even among a crowd of eager helpers, what was it here in the little circle of dim light hedged in by darkness? Those two alone, so strangely contrasted. It had been a sharp, fierce transition, even to