But when Nannie said, eagerly, "Blair has written Elizabeth that he will be at home to-morrow; I'll tell him you want to see him; and oh, Mamma, won't you please be nice to him?"--she looked perfectly blank. Toward morning she sat silently for a whole hour sucking her thumb. When, abruptly, she came to herself and realized what she had been doing, the shamed color rose in her face. Nannie, kneeling at her side, caught at the flicker of intelligence to say, "Mamma, would you like to see the Rev. Mr. Gore? He is here; waiting in the parlor. Sha'n't I bring him in?" Mrs. Maitland frowned. "What does he come for now? I'm sick. I can't see people. Besides, I sent him a check for Foreign Missions last month." "Oh, Mamma!" Nannie said, brokenly, "he hasn't come for money; I--I sent for him." Sarah Maitland's eyes suddenly opened; her mind cleared instantly. "Oh," she said; and then, slowly: "Um-m; I see." She seemed to meditate a moment; then she said, gravely: "No, my dear, no; I won't see little Gore. He's a good little man; a very good little man for missions and that sort of thing. But when it comes to _this_--" she paused; "I haven't time to see to him," she said, soberly. A minute later, noticing Nannie's tears, she tried to cheer her: "Come, come! don't be troubled," she said, smiling kindly, "I can paddle my own canoe, my dear." After that she was herself for nearly half an hour. Once she said. "My house is in order, friend Ferguson." Then she lost herself again. To those who watched her, huddled on the heap of cushions, mumbling and whimpering, or with a jerk righting her mind into stony endurance, she seemed like a great tower falling and crumbling in upon itself. At that last dreadful touch of decay, when she put her thumb in her mouth like a baby, her stepdaughter nearly fainted. All that night the mists gathered, and thinned, and gathered again. In the morning, still lying on the floor, propped against all the pillows and cushions of the house, she suddenly looked with clear eyes at Nannie. "Why!" she said, in her own voice, and frowning sharply, "that certificate of deposit! I got it from the Bank the day of the accident, but I haven't indorsed it! Lucky I've got it here in the house. Bring it to me. It's in the safe in my desk. Take my keys."