“Bessie is certainly not here:  possibly she’s still at Watervliet,” I whispered to; Hiram as the concluding hymn began.  “But I’ll have a chance at Elder Nebson and that woman before they leave the house.”

The rain had ceased for some time, and as again the wild chant went up from those harsh strained voices, a stray sunbeam, like a gleam of good promise, shot across the floor.  But what was this little figure stealing in through a side-door and joining the circling throng?—­a figure in lilac gown, with the stiff muslin cap and folded neckerchief.  She entered at the farthest corner of the room, and I watched her approach with beating heart.  Something in the easy step was familiar, and yet it could not be.  She passed around with the rest in the inner circle, and, leaning forward, I held my breath lest indeed it might be she.

The circle opened, and again the long line of march around the room.  The lilac figure came nearer and nearer, and now I see her face.  It is Bessie!

With a cry I sprang up, but with a blow, a crash, a horrible darkness swept over me like a wave, and I knew nothing.

When I came to myself I was lying on a bed in a room that was new to me.  A strong light, as of the setting sun, shone upon the whitewashed wall.  There was a little table, over which hung a looking-glass, surmounted by two fans of turkey feathers.  I stared feebly at the fans for a while, and then closed my eyes again.

Where was I?  I had a faint remembrance of jolting in a wagon, and of pitying faces bent over me, but where was I now?  Again I opened my eyes, and noted the gay patchwork covering of the bed, and the green paper curtain of the window in the golden wall—­green, with a tall yellow flower-pot on it, with sprawling roses of blue and red.  Turning with an effort toward the side whence all the brightness came, in a moment two warm arms were round my neck, and a face that I could not see was pressed close to mine.

“Oh, Charlie, Charlie! forgive, forgive me for being so bad!”

“Bessie,” I answered dreamingly, and seemed to be drifting away again.  But a strong odor of pungent salts made my head tingle again, and when I could open my eyes for the tears they rested on my darling’s face—­my own darling in a soft white dress, kneeling by my bedside, with both her arms round me.  A vigorous patting of the pillow behind me revealed Mrs. Splinter, tearful too:  “He’s come to now.  Don’t bother him with talk, Miss Bessie.  I’ll fetch the tea.”

And with motherly insistance she brought me a steaming bowl of beef-tea, while I still lay, holding Bessie’s hand, with a feeble dawning that the vision was real.

“No,” she said as Bessie put out her arm for the bowl, “you prop up his head.  I’ve got a steddyer hand:  you’d just spill it all over his go-to-meetin’ suit.”

I looked down at myself.  I was still dressed in the clothes that I had worn—­when was it? last week?—­when I had started for the Shaker meeting.