I can never remember how he told her--in what language or fashion--but we gathered the sense of it at last; my father had left home, and had taken Miss Reinhart with him! The blow had fallen--the worst had come.

Oh, Heaven! if, sleeping or waking, I could ever forget my mother's face--if I could close my eyes without seeing its white, stony horror! The very tone of her voice was changed.
"Doctor Dalkeith!" she asked, "is this horrible thing true--true ?" "Unhappily, Lady Tayne," he replied.
"You say that my husband, Sir Roland has left me, and has gone away--with--this person ?" "I am afraid it is but too true," he replied.
"Has he ceased to love me, that he has done this ?" "My dear Lady Tayne, I know nothing but the facts--nothing else.

Your servants sent for me to break it to you, for they could not bear to do it themselves." "My servants," she said, mechanically.

She still held the flowers we had gathered in her hand, the lovely sprays of mignonette! suddenly they fell to the floor, and in a strange, hoarse voice, my mother cried: "I must follow him!" Oh, wondrous power of love! My mother, who had been crippled and helpless so long, whose feet had never taken one step; my mother suddenly stood up, her face white, her eyes filled with wild fire.

She stretched out her hands--into those dead limbs of hers seemed to spring sudden life.
"I must follow them," she said, and she took what seemed to us two or three steps and then once again she fell with her face to the ground.
"I knew it would kill her," said the rector.