“She _is_ beautiful,” agreed Mrs. Pennington; “but I venture to say that she is looking her worst right now. She doesn’t appear at all well, to me. Her complexion is very sallow, and sometimes there is the strangest expression in her eyes--almost wild. The nervous shock of her mother’s death must have been very severe; but she bears up wonderfully, at that, and she is so sweet and appreciative!” “I sized her up over there in the kitchen to-day,” said Custer. “She’s the real article. I can always tell by the way people treat a servant whether they are real people or only counterfeit. She was as sweet and natural to Hannah as she is to mother.” “I noticed that,” said his mother. “It is one of the hall marks of good breeding; but we could scarcely expect anything else of Mrs. Burke’s daughter. I know she must be a fine character.” In the room above them Shannon Burke, with trembling hands and staring eyes, was inserting a slender needle beneath the skin above her hip. In the movies one does not disfigure one’s arms or legs. CHAPTER XIV The day of the funeral had come and gone. It had been a very hard one for Shannon. She had determined that on this day, at least, she would not touch the little hypodermic syringe. She owed that much respect to the memory of her mother. And she had fought--God, how she had fought!--with screaming nerves that would not be quiet, with trembling muscles, and with a brain that held but a single thought--morphine, morphine, morphine! She tried to shut the idea from her mind. She tried to concentrate her thoughts upon the real anguish of her heart. She tried to keep before her a vision of her mother; but her hideous, resistless vice crowded all else from her brain, and the result was that on the way back from the cemetery she collapsed into screaming, incoherent hysteria. They carried her to her room--Custer Pennington carried her, his father and mother following. When the men had left, Mrs. Pennington and Eva undressed her and comforted her and put her to bed; but she still screamed and sobbed--frightful, racking sobs, without tears. She was trying to tell them to go away. How she hated them! If they would only go away and leave her! But she could not voice the words she sought to scream at them, and so they stayed and ministered to her as best they could. After a while she lost consciousness, and they thought that she was asleep and left her. Perhaps she did sleep, for later, when she opened her eyes, she lay very quiet, and felt rested and almost normal. She knew, though, that she was not entirely awake--that when full wakefulness came the terror would return unless she quickly had recourse to the little needle.