The little girl, always alert as a bird, ran and peeped into the wardrobe, then called out,--

"No, here it is! I thought she didn't have it. She took her other, 'cause it's newer. She'll be awful cold to pay for it, won't she, Sara?"

"I'm afraid she'll take cold," said the older girl, with a worried look.

"Put another stick on the fire, Morton, and shut the shed door tight when you come through. How the wind does blow!"

Mrs. Olmstead had gone early that afternoon, with a neighbor, to attend the funeral of a friend in the next village, and must return through this storm in an open wagon, very insufficiently clad.

It was dark before the party arrived; and as she came in shaking her wet clothes, and trying to make light of her shiverings, Sara looked at her in alarm.

"You've taken cold, mother," she said, handing the eager, crowing baby to Morton, and hurrying to divest the little woman of her wet wrappings.

"No, I guess not," she answered hoa.r.s.ely, her teeth chattering so that she could scarcely speak; "but I'm ch--chilly now."

She huddled over the fire, while Sara and Molly brought warm, dry clothing, and chafed her bloodless hands. Their solicitude touched her.

"You was allus good to me, girls!" she said gratefully. "I feel lots better now. This fire's rale comfortin'!" bending almost into it in her desire for warmth.

But the vociferous baby would no longer be silenced; and she took him from Morton's arms to her own, hugging him close, and growing warmer at once from the contact of his dear little body.

"It's good to be home agin," she murmured sleepily. "I hope your pa's safe at anchor to-night: it's terrible bad weather, Sairay."

"Where did the rain overtake you, mother?" asked the latter, as she hurried about preparing a cup of hot tea and a plateful of food.

"Jest this side the cross-roads; and, my! how it did drive! We got it e'enamost in our full faces, an' it cut like a knife; but 'twas jest as fur back as 'twas forwards, an' Mis' Ruttger was as anxious to git home to her young uns as I was. Yah-h! but I'm sleepy!" with a long yawn.

"You'd better get right to bed, mother, as soon as you've eaten this; and I'll undress baby and bring him to you. You're warmer now?"

"Rale comf'able, thank ye. I do hope they ain't got any such wind out to the Banks! You ain't asked me about the funeral, Sairay."

"I was so busy, mother; were there many there?"

"E'enamost a hundred, I should think; they come from as far away as Norcross an' Weskisset. P'fessor Page of the seminary was there, an' he asked after you; he said you was a fine scholard. Then there was the Pettibones, an' the Hornblowers, an' the Scrantouns. Oh, 'twas a grand buryin'!"

"Did they all wear c.r.a.pe tied round their arms? and how many white horses did you see?" broke in Molly. "If you saw seven in a row, it means you'll die 'fore the year's up. I never saw but five."

"Hush, Molly! Don't talk such foolishness! Come, mother, your voice sounds very hoa.r.s.e and tired. Hadn't you better get right to bed?"

"Wall, I guess so; but don't hurry me so, Sairay! I kain't a-bear to be hurried! An' I'm tryin' to think how many horses I did see, but--I've-- forgotten."

Another long yawn, while her head drooped wearily; and Sara, alarmed at her white face and the purple rings about her eyes, hurried her away without more ado, in spite of her drowsy and fretful resistance. She had scarcely touched the pillow, however, when she dropped into a heavy slumber; and the girl, filled with vague forebodings over her, and also because of the storm, sent unwilling Molly up-stairs alone, and camped down, fully dressed, before the fire, with a pillow and comforter.

The next thing she realized was the feeling that she was rising out of unknown depths of nothingness; and, after one bewildered glance about the room, she finally became conscious of a faint, hoa.r.s.e voice calling, "Sairay! Sairay!"

She dragged herself to her feet, all cramped and stiff from her uncomfortable position, and at last, fully aware of her surroundings, answered, "Yes, mother, I'm coming!" as she hastened to the bedside.

Bending over it, she fairly started at the pallor of the face upon the pillow, from which the dark eyes seemed starting with an expression of pain and anxiety which set her heart to beating heavily.

"Sairay," whispered that strange voice, "I'm sick--I'm awful sick--in here."

The hand, already at her side, pressed it more closely, and her brows contracted with pain.

"O mother! what is it? your lungs? You've taken a dreadful cold."

She nodded; and Sara flew to call Morton, and send him for the doctor, then heated the flannels her mother asked for, and vainly tried to soothe the now frightened and crying baby.

It seemed an age till the doctor came stamping in,--a pudgy little man, with an expression of unquenchable good-humor on his round, florid face.

"Well, well," he said briskly, rubbing his hands before the freshly kindled blaze, "caught cold, has she? Lungs sore? That's right! Plenty of hot flannels. Now, let me see."

Having warmed himself, he proceeded to examine the sick woman; and Sara saw that his face was more serious as he turned away. He gave her careful directions about the medicines, and said he should look in again after breakfast (it was now towards morning); then tied his hat down with an old worsted tippet, and prepared to depart.

Sara followed him outside of the door, unmindful of the sweeping gusts of wind, and his admonitions to stay indoors or she too would be ill.

"Yes, doctor, but just a moment; what is it?"

"Pneumonia."

"Oh! and is she very sick?"

"Well, you look after her just as I tell you, and, G.o.d willing, we'll pull her through. Now go in and dry yourself quick! I don't want two patients in one house."

He pushed her in, shut the door behind her with a bang, and was gone.

The memory of the next three days was always like a troubled dream to Sara,--one of those frightful dreams in which one is laboring to go somewhere, to do something, without success. Work as she would, day and night, a.s.sisted by the kindly neighbors and the frightened children, she could not stay the progress of that fatal disease; and on the fourth it terminated in the going out of that life which, with all its faults, had been kindly in impulse at least.

As Sara bent over her mother at the last, trying to win a word, a look, the closed lids were raised a moment, and the dying woman said feebly, "Sairay, you've--allus--been good! Don't leave--the baby. There's--the-- money;" and, unable to finish, her voice ceased, her tired lids closed for their last, long sleep. She would never find fault, never give commendation, again. How the thought smote Sara as she stood helplessly gazing down upon her through her blinding tears!

"O mother, mother! I ought to have been more patient," she moaned as they led her away; "but I will try and make amends by my goodness to baby."

"Yes, that's right," said Mrs. Ruttger, wiping her eyes. "We kain't none of us help what's pa.s.sed atween us an' the dead, but it oughter make us better to the livin'. Not thet I blame you, Sairay; some folks, even good ones, is dretful tryin' at times; but I know jest haow you feel, fur I've been thar myself."

There is among these honest fisherfolk a strong feeling of communism, which shows itself in the kindliest ways. They may be close-fisted, hard-headed, and sharp-tongued with each other when well and prosperous; but let poverty, wreck, illness, or death overtake one of their number, and the "nighest" of them at a bargain will open heart and purse with an astonishing generosity.

Sara found all responsibility taken out of her hands. In fact, Miss Prue, finding her standing in the midst of her room with her hand pressed to her head, gazing bewilderedly about, and asking softly, "Where am I?" took her vigorously in hand, and soon had her in bed, where, exhausted as she was, she slept for hours without dreams or movement,--a sleep which doubtless saved her an illness, and brought her strong young body into excellent condition once more.

Through all this Sara longed inexpressibly for her father, but knew it was hopeless wishing.

All she could do was to intrust the news to a fishing-smack which was about leaving harbor, and might possibly run across the Nautilus somewhere on the broad highway of the ocean. Yet, even then, he could only return in case of some lucky opportunity; for the fleet would not put back for weeks yet, as this was their harvest-time, when even the dead must wait, that the necessities of the living might be supplied.

After a few days things were strangely quiet and natural once more.

Morton and Molly, thoroughly subdued for the time by recent events, helped her about the house, the short winter's term of school having closed for the long vacation.

Even the baby seemed less fretful than before; and the lengthening, softening days went by in a quiet that left Sara many hours for her beloved books.

But the children were needing clothes, and she herself must have a cotton gown; so, as the little store of silver in the old blue teapot had been almost exhausted by the simple funeral requirements, she put on her sunbonnet one afternoon, and leaving the baby, with many injunctions, to the care of the twins, started to call on Squire Scrantoun, who had for many years been her father's banker.

The old gentleman's office was in a wing of his big yellow house of colonial architecture, and was entered by means of a gla.s.s door, which now stood open in the balmy warmth of an early June day.