She had to make a superhuman effort to keep her attention fixed on Mary.
'Go!' said the hoarse whisper close beside her, and the girl lifted her wasted hand, and pushed her visitor from her.

'Go!' it repeated insistently, with a sort of wild beseeching then, brokenly, the gasping breath interrupting: 'There's naw fear--naw fear--fur the likes o' you!' Catherine rose.
'I'm not afraid,' she said gently, but her hand shook as she pushed her chair back; 'God is everywhere, Mary.' She put on her hat and cloak, said something in Mrs.Irwin's ear, and stooped to kiss the brow which to the shuddering sense under her will seemed already cold and moist with the sweats of death.

Mary watched her go; Mrs.Irwin, with the air of one bewildered, drew her chair nearer to the settle; and the light of the fire, shooting and dancing through the June twilight, threw such fantastic shadows over the face on the pillow that all expression was lost.

What was moving in the crazed mind?
Satisfaction, perhaps, at having got rid of one witness, one gaoler, one of the various antagonistic forces surrounding her?
She had a dim, frenzied notion she should have to fight for her liberty when the call came, and she lay tense and rigid, waiting--the images of insanity whirling through her brain, while the light slowly, slowly waned.
Catherine opened the door to the kitchen.

The two carriers were standing there, and Robert Elsmere also stood with his back to her, talking to them in an undertone.
He turned at the sound behind him, and his start brought a sudden rush to Catherine's check.