What a useless routine, for one left alone, to be fed, to sleep, and to rise up to eat and sleep again! Mercy bore all this in a sort of dumb bewilderment for a few days.

All Stephen's love and sympathy did not help her.

He was unutterably tender and sympathizing now that poor old Mrs.Carr was fairly out of his way.

It surprised even himself to see what a sort of respectful affection he felt for her in her grave.

Any misgiving that this new quiet and undisturbed possession of Mercy might not continue did not cross his mind; and when Mercy said to him suddenly, one evening about ten days after her mother's death, "Stephen, I must go away, I can't live in this house another week," it was almost as sudden a shock to him as if he had gone in and found her dead.
"Go away! Leave me!" he gasped, rather than said.