"Oh, sir, she's DEAD!"

"Dead!—Miss Carrington—what do you
mean?"

"I mean that, sir—that she's dead."

At this moment Gabrielle came out of her
room just in time to hear the announcement.
She and her husband exchanged one look of
consternation, and both, without a word, ascended
the stairs that led to Miss Carrington's room.

At the door Gabrielle paused. She laid her
hand upon her husband's arm, to detain him.

"Oh, Gilbert," she ejaculated, " what can this
mean?"

Her husband shook his head, and, pausing for
a moment to press her hand reassuringly, softly
turned the handle of the door, and entered the
room, Gabrielle following him.

One glance told them both that they were in
the presence of Death.

The room was darkened, and in considerable
disorder. Everything was as it had been left
overnight, or pushed aside in the morning
confusion. The chair on which Miss Carrington
had been seated when Gabrielle last saw her was
in the same spot. The small table on which the
supper-tray had been placed was drawn up beside
it. Articles of apparel were scattered here and
there, and the dressing-gown which Miss
Carrington had worn on the previous night lay on
the great arm-chair. The embers of the fire that
had died out still encumbered the grate.

Another fire had died out that night, or during
the long morning which followed it. On the bed
placed against the wall in the middle of the room
—and this was orderly arranged at least—lay the
body of Diana Carrington. Already the limbs
had been composed by loving hands, which were
even now finishing the pious work. The servant
was rendering the last service to the mistress
whom she had loved—the last homage which one
human being can offer to another.

It has not been our fortune in this narrative to
see much of the good side of either of these two,
but we have seen enough to feel sure that at
least they were attached to each other.

On the features of the dead lady there was set
that stamp which gives a dignity of its own to
every face on which it is impressed—the stamp
of death. No one could look upon that
countenance and bear malice, or remember wrong
or indignity.  The majesty of death was there,
and Gabrielle felt it, as she stood and gazed upon
the corpse from a distance, and alone.

Alone, for her husband, after one hasty glance
at the dead woman, had whispered hurriedly that
he would go to seek a medical man, and had left
the room, while as to her who was still engaged
about the body, she was at present too much
absorbed in her awful task to make Gabrielle's
solitude less isolated. Indeed, for the time, this
woman seemed unconscious that she was not
alone in the room. Great gasping sobs burst
from her as she proceeded with her work, and
the tears, like an extreme unction of love, fell
fast upon her mistress's body.

She had been the nurse of the woman who lay
there dead, and she had carried her in her arms
and ministered to her so incessantly and carefully,
that she had got to look upon her as a daughter,
and to love her with that sort of fierce affection
which belonged to her tigerish nature. The
work she was now engaged in was congenial to
her, and she would have died herself rather than
have allowed another to do it. No hands but
hers for that work.

And Gabrielle stood and looked on, hardly
knowing what she had best do. She was afraid
to come forward lest she should seem to intrude,
while she felt as if to remain still was to appear
unfeeling and almost insensible. At last her
kind nature settled the question. This woman's
sorrow touched her heart, and she made a step
or two forward, intending to speak some words
of sympathy and kindness.

Her first movement seemed to disturb Jane
Cantanker at her work, and she turned hastily
round. The very tears seemed to dry up in her
eyes as she looked at Gabrielle, and as she stood
between her and her dead mistress.

"Keep back," she said, in a hoarse voice.
"You shall not come nigh her. What do you
want here at all?"

Gabrielle's consternation was utter. She was
not prepared for this. Such fierce anger, and in
the very presence of the dead, too.

"I only came because I thought I might be of
some use, or some comfort, at any rate?" she
said.

"Comfort! What do you mean by comfort?"
cried the woman, still standing before the bed in
a menacing attitude. " I hate the sight of you,
I tell you. What right have you to come into
the room where she is? It's insulting the dead.
I wonder you have the boldness to do it. But
I'll be revenged upon you yet. I know something,
and I'll be avenged, and so shall she, poor
lamb," she added, pointing to the corpse.
"I've watched you, watched you closely, and I
know what's been in your mind this long time,
with your quiet, creeping ways, and I know, too,
what's been in my mind, and what's there still,
mind you."

The woman had changed. There was nothing
of the ridiculous about her now. She was a
Fury, a Sybil of old denouncing vengeance. We
have laughed at Jane Cantanker before now, but
there was no laughing at this. It was too dreadful.

"What hand have you had in this?" the furious
woman broke out again, and pointing once
more to the dead body. "Yes, you may well
start. What have you had to do with it? You
hated her, you know you did. You thought she
wronged you, and you hated her according. And
now she's dead, and you think yourself revenged;
but who's to revenge her, think you? Oh, you
shall hear of it again, whatever you may think,
and that quickly."

This scene, so sudden, so unexpected, so
terrible, was almost too much for Gabrielle. She
trembled, and her knees shook under her.