She sprang up, shook back her thick, disordered black hair, and exclaimed: "Who brought me here?" "I did, honey," said Miss Jerusha, speaking as gently as _she_ knew how, which is not saying much. "Where is mamma?" "Oh, she's--how did you sleep last night?" said Miss Jerusha, actually quailing inwardly in anticipation of the coming scene; for, with her strong nerves and plain, practical view of things in general, the good old lady had a masculine horror of scenes. "Where is my mamma?" said the child, sharply, fixing her piercing black eyes on Miss Jerusha's face. "Oh, she's--well, she ain't here." "Where is she, then? You ugly old thing, what have you done to my mamma?" "Ugly old thing! Oh, dear bless me! _there's_ a way to speak to her elders!" said the deeply shocked Miss Jerusha. "_Where's my mamma?_" exclaimed the child, with a fierce stamp of the foot. "Little gal, look here! that ain't no way to talk to--" "WHERE'S MY MAMMA?" fairly shrieked the little girl, as she sprang forward and clutched Miss Jerusha's arm so fiercely as to extort from her a cry of pain. "Ah-a-a-a-a-a! Oh-h-h-h! you little crab-fish, if you ain't pinched my arm black and blue! Your mamma's dead, and it's a pity you ain't along with her," said Miss Jerusha, in her anger and pain, giving the girl a push that sent her reeling against the wall. "Dead!" The word fell like a blow on the child, stunning her into quiet. Her mamma dead! She could not realize--she could not comprehend it. She stood as if frozen, her hand uplifted as it had been when she heard it, her lips apart, her eyes wide open and staring. Dead! She stood still, stunned, bewildered. Miss Jerusha was absolutely terrified. She had expected tears, cries, passionate grief, but not this ominous stillness. That fixed, rigid, unnatural look chilled her blood. She went over and shook the child in her alarm. "Little girl! Georgey! don't look so--_don't_! It ain't right, you know!" She turned her eyes slowly to Miss Jerusha's face, her lips parted, and one word slowly dropped out: "Mamma!" "Honey, your ma's dead, and gone to heaven--I _hope_," said Miss Jerusha, who felt that common politeness required her to say so, although she had her doubts on the subject. "You mustn't take on about it, you--Oh, gracious! the child's gone stark, staring mad!" Her words had broken the spell. Little Georgia realized it all at last. With a shriek,--a wild, terrific shriek, that Miss Jerusha never forgot--she threw up her arms and fell prostrate on the ground. And there she lay and _shrieked_. She did not faint. Miss Jerusha, with her hands clasped over her bruised and wounded ear-drums, wished from the bottom of her heart she _would_; but Georgia was of too sanguine a temperament to faint. Shriek after shriek, sharp, prolonged, and shrill, broke from her lips as she lay on her face on the floor, her hands clasped over her head.