"Why was I not sent for before?" said the doctor angrily to one of the neighbours; "this is just the way with you all: you give yourselves up to a quack till you have one foot in the grave, and then send for the doctor, and expect him to work miracles for your cure! Oh, I beg your pardon, sir," said the medical man, interrupting himself, and raising his hat on perceiving the presence of Mr. Trevor and his daughter. "Is there no hope for the poor woman?" asked the master of Myst Court in a voice too low to reach the ear of the patient. The doctor, in his reply, observed less consideration. "The disease has gone too far--too far--and the poor creature's strength is exhausted. She cannot struggle through now. She has been half starved with hunger and cold, and has had neither proper care and medicine, nor the food which was absolutely necessary to keep up her vital powers. I can do nothing in this case--nothing!" Emmie had but paused to hear the doctor's opinion, and then, with a heavy heart, she glided to the bedside and bent over the dying woman. Emmie had but once before stood by a death-bed, and that was when she had been brought, while but a child, to receive a mother's last kiss and blessing. To Emmie the scene before her was inexpressibly solemn and sad. The widow's life was ebbing away, but her mind was clear. "I thought that you'd have come again," were the faint words which struggled forth from her pale lips as she recognized the young lady. Those words went to Emmie's heart like a knife. There had, then, been expectation and disappointment; the lady's visit had been watched for, hoped for, and it had not been made till too late! Hollow, wistful eyes were raised to Emmie's. Again the poor sufferer spoke, but so feebly that Miss Trevor had to bend very low indeed to catch the meaning of what she said. "They say I'm dying--and death is so awful!" murmured the widow. "Not to those who have given their hearts to Him who died for sinners!" whispered Emmie softly in the sufferer's ear. "I've had no one to tell me of these things, and I be not learned. But--but I've not led a bad life; I've harmed no one," said the dying widow, grasping, as so many unenlightened sinners do, at that false hope of safety which can only break in their hands. "She's al'ays been a good neighbour, and a decent, respectable body!" cried Mrs. Blunt, who was bustling about in the cottage, disturbing, by her noisy presence, the chamber of death. "It's worse than useless for you all to come crowding here," said the doctor roughly. "Mrs. Wall, you may be wanted, but let the rest go out and leave the poor creature to the lady; can't you let a woman die in quiet?" And enforcing his words by emphatic gestures, the doctor soon succeeded in partially clearing the cottage. He then took his leave of Mr. Trevor, and quitted the place in which he knew that his medical skill could be of no avail.