Mrs.Hollingford came to me, questioning me anxiously, and pressing my burning temples between her cool palms; and there I lay under her hands, crushed with my cruel secret.

I could not tell it.

Not that night.

When the worst must be known it would be my place to help them all in their agony; and was I fit for such a task now?
Besides, there was still a hope, and I clung to it with wild energy.
They left me for the night, thinking I slept, but when the clock struck five I wrapped myself in a cloak, and went out and down the avenue.

I was half afraid of the ghostly trees, so black against the snow, but I was more in terror of the melancholy corners of my own room, the solitary light, the dreary ashes in the grate.