By this time the wind had grown more violent, and blew continuously, and the rattling of snow like frozen dust against the window seemed never to cease.

A dim daylight had begun to creep into the room, but it was even colder and more cheerless than the darkness.

Presently a young Indian girl, whom Mrs.Hall had trained for service, came softly into the room and began to coax the still burning embers of the fire into a blaze.

She went about her work with a silent deftness which would have done credit to the best of housemaids, and yet in all her motions there was something of that free natural grace which belongs to her people.
When she had done, and was standing for a moment to see if the fire 'drew' properly, Mrs.Costello spoke to her.

She understood no English, however, or at least she understood none addressed to her by a strange voice, and said so in her own soft musical language.