"As if I could! There never was anybody that got so little sympathy as I do," she fretted, turning from the door and dropping into her chair again. "But I'll have another doctor. I'll send for Dr. Buell." "Dr. Walter Buell; 'Dr. Water Gruel' they call him," laughed Flora, "because he won't let 'em have anything hardly to eat. He'll starve you, mother." "Be quiet, Flora," was the angry rejoinder. "I'm not going to have you laughing at me. You ought to be ashamed of yourself, poor unfortunate creature that I am, and your mother too! "To think that I should have happened here to-day of all days, when I don't stir from home once in a month! But that cat wouldn't have gone mad if I hadn't been here." But her complaining fell upon inattentive ears. Mrs. Nash was busy ridding the house of the dead carcass and setting things in order, and Nell's thoughts were full of the new joy that had come to her, and of questionings as to when and where she should again meet him who had possessed himself of her heart's best affection. Would he return that evening? Verily she believed he would. But no, he did not; and when she went home the following day, Clare greeted her with the news that Dr. Clendenin had gone East; he had been suddenly summoned to Glen Forest by a letter; some one was very ill, and as a pirogue was just leaving for Cincinnati, he had taken passage and gone down the river in it. Nell's cheek paled a trifle and her eyes looked with mute questioning into those of her sister. "He left good-by for you," said Clare. And that was all--all! The girl's heart seemed to stand still with pain. What could it mean? CHAPTER XI. The tops of the Alleghanies loomed up darkly against the eastern sky as it flushed with the rosy hues of a new day; the delicate shades of rose pink and pale blue changed to crimson and gold, and anon the increasing light aroused old Vashti from the heavy slumber into which she had fallen some hours before. She started up, rubbed her eyes, and glancing from the window, muttered, "'Bout time dis chile was wakin' up and lookin' after tings. Sun's jus' gwine to peep 'bove dose mountings. Wonder how ole marster is 'bout dis time?" She had thrown herself down upon her bed without undressing. Finishing her remarks with something between a sigh and a groan, she slowly gathered herself up and went stumbling from the room, hardly more than half awake yet, having lost much sleep in the last two or three weeks. But reaching the upper chamber where her mistress had kept solitary vigil through the night, she entered very quietly, extinguished the candle, drew aside the window curtains, letting in the morning light and air, then stepping to the foot of the bed, stood silently gazing upon its occupant, the big tears stealing down her sable cheeks. The form lying there was attenuated, the face thin, haggard, deathly; the sunken eyes were closed, and the breath came fitfully from the ghastly, parted lips.