I asked John what could be the matter with her, and he said he could only think she was going crazed." John Massingbird nodded his head, as if in confirmation.

Old Matthew Frost spoke up, his voice trembling with the emotion that he was striving to keep under-- "Did she say what it was that had come to her, ma'am ?" "She did not make any reply at all," rejoined Mrs.Verner.

"But it is quite nonsense to suppose she could have fallen into that wild burst of grief simply at being joked about Luke.

I could not make her out." "And she has fallen into fretting, you say, ma'am, lately ?" pursued Matthew Frost, leaning his venerable white head forward.
"Often and often," replied Mrs.Verner.

"She has seemed quite an altered girl in the last few weeks!" "My son's wife has said the same," cried old Matthew.