At that awe-struck cry from Flower's lips the terribly changed woman looked quickly up, and her face grew, if possible, more ghastly than before. She threw out both hands, crying hoarsely: "Go out of my sight this moment!" "But, mamma--" began the startled girl. "Go, I say--and at once!" Mrs. Fielding cried out, in such harsh and threatening accents that poor Flower fled affrighted from the room. In the hall she encountered Jewel, dressed for walking. She ran up to her eagerly, crying out: "Oh, sister, our black mammy died last night, and poor mamma is almost crazed with grief. Her beautiful black hair has turned white as snow, and her face is like an old woman's. And," with a choking sob, "she drove me out of her room." "I will go to her!" cried Jewel, turning toward her mother's room. The next moment she was gazing with horrified eyes at the terrible physical wreck that had so startled poor Flower, who was now cowering at the door, afraid to enter. "Go, leave me!" Mrs. Fielding cried, angrily, to Jewel. "Mamma!" "Go!" she reiterated, wildly; but Jewel stood her ground like a statue. "I am not going until I know the meaning of this," she replied, firmly. "Why, mamma, your black hair has turned snowy-white in a few hours! You have become an old woman since last night!" Mrs. Fielding caught up a loose tress of hair from her shoulder and stared at it with dilated eyes. A bitter cry broke from her lips. "What does it matter if my hair has turned to snow? My heart changed to fire long since. Go, girl, leave me to myself!" Jewel made no sign of obeying. She said, curiously: "So our old nurse is dead, mamma?" "Dead--yes! I wish she had died twenty years ago! I wish she had never been born!" Mrs. Fielding burst out, furiously. "But I thought you were fond of her, mamma!" Jewel exclaimed, in momentary wonder. Then a sudden light broke over her mind. "Ah, I remember now! Sam said she had a secret to tell you. Was it that secret which turned you against Maria?" Mrs. Fielding gave a startled look, and muttered: "Sam is a fool! There was no secret!" "And she had nothing to tell you, mamma?" "Nothing of any consequence. The old woman was in her dotage, and since she joined the Methodist Church she had persuaded herself that she was the vilest of sinners, and that she must confess all the petty sins of her life to me, or she would go to perdition. But there was nothing--nothing." "But you said just now that you wished she had never been born, and your hair is white all in a few hours. There must be some awful reason for that," persisted Jewel, her curiosity thoroughly aroused; but Mrs. Fielding turned upon her defiantly. "There is nothing, I tell you, except that I have been maddened with neuralgia all night, and that is reason enough for the change in my hair. Now go, and remember, no more questions about Maria's foolish secrets. Let them be buried in her grave!"