The parsonage was cruelly inhospitable. No door was left unfastened. I knocked at a window opening on the veranda. I gave the signal-knock that Sophie and I had listened and opened to, unhesitatingly, for many years. It needed nothing more. Instantly I heard Sophie say,--"That's Anna's knock"; and immediately thereafter the curtain was put aside, and Sophie's precious face and azure eyes peeped out. She looked in amazement to see me thus, and in one moment more had let me in. "Wake Aaron," I said, without giving her time to question me. "He is awake. What has happened? Is Miss Axtell dying?" she questioned. "No," I said; "but I want to speak to Aaron, directly. I'm going to my room one moment." I went up. The tower-key was hanging where I had left it. I took it down, and made myself respectable by covering up my breezy hair with a hood, with the further precaution of a cloak. I had not long to wait for Aaron's coming; but it was long enough to remind me to carry some restorative with me. Aaron came. "Miss Axtell is very ill," I said; "she is quite wild, and left the house in the night. She's up in the church-yard tower. Will you help her brother take her home, as soon as you possibly can?" "How strange!" were his only words; and as I went the garden way, Aaron started to arouse his horse from morning sleep. "No one need to know the church entrance," I thought; and as I went in, I tried to close down the heavy stone, which fitted in so well, that it seemed, like all the others, built to stay. I could not stir it. Perhaps Aaron would not look, when he came in; but doubting his special blindness, I asked Mr. Axtell to put it back. He seemed to comprehend my meaning. I took his place beside Miss Axtell. She was no longer wilful or determined. Her strength was gone. Her head drooped upon my shoulder, and when I held a spoon, filled with the restorative that I had brought, to her lips, they opened, and she took that which I gave, mechanically. Her eyelids were down. I looked at the fair, beautiful face that lay so near to my eyes. It was full of the softest pencillings; little golden sinuosities of light were woven all over it; and the blue lines along which emotion flies were wonderfully arrowy and sky-like in their wanderings, for they left no trace to tell whence they came or whither led. I heard the heavy, ponderous weight let fall. It was the same sound as that which I heard on that memorable night. Miss Axtell shivered a little; or was it but the effect of the concussion? The brother came up; he looked down, kindly at me, lovingly at his sister. "Shall I relieve you?" he asked. I folded my arm only a little more tightly for answer, and said,-- "Mr. Wilton will be here soon; he is getting the carriage, to take your sister home." "I will go and help him, if you don't mind being left"; and he looked inquiringly. "There's no danger. I shall not fall asleep," I said.