She laughed and nodded to them all in the old childish way; then her lips moved.

"It's come right!" she tried to say; but the weak voice would never speak again on earth.
"It's the turn o' the night," said Mrs.

Polston, solemnly; "lift her head; the Old Year's 'goin' out." Margret lifted her head, and held it on her breast.

She could hear cries and sobs; the faces, white now, and wet, pressed nearer, yet fading slowly: it was the Old Year going out, the worn-out year of her life.

Holmes opened the window: the cold night-wind rushed in, bearing with it snatches of broken harmony: some idle musician down in the city, playing fragments of some old, sweet air, heavy with love and regret.