Her lips tried to frame the question that consumed her with its terrors. "Simeon--" she began, but her voice failed. Stephen's haggard eyes softened.

"He is dying," he said. "But there is time-perhaps to-day-perhaps to-morrow. His force of will has kept him alive to see you-he has cared more than you knew.

" She gave a little sob, and turned toward the staircase. Halfway up she stopped. "I forgot to ask you to come in," she said, "or whether you want anything I can get you? But it doesn't matter, does it? All that matters is to do Simeon's bidding.

I shall be very quick." In an incredibly short time she was back, fully dressed, and carrying a bag, into which she had thrust what was indispensable to her comfort for another day. She waked the servant, left a message for her father, and then she and Stephen went out into the street, so gay with early sunlight and twittering birds, so bare of human traffic.