He did not suffer any pain ?" "No, Uncle Charles, not much; but, though he did not say anything, his face looked worse than screaming, and he passed away very stiff in his hind-legs.

Oh!" (with a fresh outburst), "when cook told me that her sister that was in a decline had gone, I never thought," (sob, sob!) "poor Vic would be the next." A step came along the passage, a firm light step that Charles knew, that made his heart beat violently.
The door opened and a familiar voice said: "Molly! My poor Molly! I met father, and--" Ruth stood in the door-way, and stopped short.

A wave of color passed over her face, and left it paler than usual.
Charles looked at her over the mop of Molly's brown head against his breast.

Their grave eyes met, and each thought how ill the other looked.
"I did not know--I thought you were going to Slumberleigh to-day," said Ruth.
"I go to-morrow morning," replied Charles.

"I came here first." There was an awkward silence, but Molly came to their relief by a sudden rush at Ruth, and a repetition of the details of the death-bed scene of poor Vic for her benefit, for which both were grateful.
"You ought to be thinking where he is to be buried, Molly," suggested Charles, when she had finished.