The journey was made almost in silence. Mrs. Fanning wept quietly behind her pocket-handkerchief, and Alden and Emma sat with their hands clasped in each other's in mute sympathy.
It was some time after midnight when the carriage entered Wendover and drew up before the old Reindeer Hotel.
Lights about the house at that hour showed that something very unusual was transpiring within.
Hezekiah Greenfield himself came out to meet the party from Blue Cliffs.
With much gravity he greeted them, and to Mrs. Fanning's agonized inquiries about her daughter, he answered:
"I can't well tell you how she is, ma'am. But I will call Sukey, and she will take you to her."
He then conducted them into the parlor and went out in search of his wife.
Very soon good Mrs. Greenfield came waddling in.
Mrs. Fanning arose and hurried to meet her, eagerly inquiring:
"How is my child? How is she now? Does she still live?"
"Yes, ma'am, she is alive, and when she sent for you she was still in her right senses; but now she is wandering, poor girl, and imagines herself still to be living at Peerch P'int," answered the weeping woman, as she took the poor mother's hand to lead her to her daughter.
She led her to a spacious upper chamber, dimly lighted by a single taper, where on a white bed lay extended the form of the dying girl.
"Ivy, my darling! My darling Ivy, do you know me?" tenderly whispered the poor mother, taking her erring daughter's wasted hand and gazing into the fading face, nothing but love and sorrow and forgiveness in her heart.
"Is that you, mamma? Is it near morning? I'm so glad!" said the dying girl, panting as she spoke. "Oh, I've had such a dreadful dream, mamma--such a long, dreadful dream! I dreamed of doing such horrible and wicked things--that I never could have done in my waking hours. I have lived long years in last night's dreadful dream. I am glad it is morning. Kiss me, mamma."
These were her last words, panted forth with her last breath. The mother's kiss fell upon "unanswering clay."
Katharine Fanning was borne in a fainting condition from the death-bed of her daughter and conveyed to another chamber, where she received the most sympathetic and affectionate ministrations from Emma and Alden Lytton.