Ernestine stood in the sitting-room door, and as the words were uttered, she saw Bea rush out, heard a faint scream, and a strange voice say, "catch her, she's falling;" then there came a tramp of feet across the porch, and four men crossed the hall, and came into the room with a strange burden; a rude litter, with a motionless figure on a mattress! Bea had fainted, for she had followed it, but as the men set their burden down with pitying faces, there came a shrill scream and a fall, for Ernestine dropped to the floor, and Jean continued to scream with her face hid. The three girls from up stairs came flying down, Huldah ran from the kitchen, and in the dire confusion, the strangers stood, not knowing what to do, or whom to address, for every one seemed to have lost self-possession in the overwhelming shock. So thought the gentleman who seemed to be leader, but at that minute a hand touched his arm, and a voice startlingly hushed, asked: "Is he _dead_?" "He is, madam." A spasm of pain crossed her set-white face, as her lips opened slowly, and the next question came with a gasp of dread: "By--by his own hand?" "Oh, no, madam, no indeed," cried the gentleman eagerly, glad to give that relief. "He was on the train going down to the city, which was wrecked twenty miles this side of it. His death was instant and painless, a blow on the left temple." "Thank God!" She uttered it slowly, and almost below her breath, then lifted her eyes from the peaceful face so life-like in death, and looked around the room. Ernestine lay moaning on the lounge, Kittie and Kat locked in each others arms crouched in the corner, tearless, because paralyzed with fright, Jean shook as with a spasm in Bea's lap, while Huldah stood by the lounge, with her apron over her head; and the men stood hushed and abashed with their eyes down. "Take Jean out," Olive said again in that strange still voice. "Huldah carry Ernestine to her room, and Kittie, you and Kat go out to the steps and watch for mama." How instantly they all obeyed her, as though recognizing one with authority, and how curiously the gentleman scanned her stonily white face, so worn in this brief moment of suffering, and listened to her last words with wonder. "Then you are not Mrs. Dering?" "No!" Olive did not seem surprised at the question, but her eyes went to his face slowly, and her lips began to twitch. "How will we ever tell her; oh! how will we?" she murmured, clasping her hands tightly; but the stranger heard the low words, and spoke hurriedly, with his eyes on the dead face. "If you are expecting her, some one had better go to prepare her, for the shock might prove----" Olive did not wait for more, but snatching a shawl from the chair, saying as she vanished: "I will go, only stay 'till we come back."