showed the same open-armed and open-hearted motherly affection with which, as Constance remembered, Mamma had received her, Constance, at the door, on the landing, on the first evening of her own return. Dear Mamma!
It touched her so much that she herself rose, went to Bertha, kissed her tenderly, kissed Louise and Marianne. Her voice, for the first time for many a day, had a sisterly note in it that took Bertha by surprise. She pressed Constance' hand and, after the others had spoken to her, sat down quietly near Mamma, Aunt Lot and Constance. How pale, dejected and resigned she was! She seemed to be looking helplessly around her, to be looking for some one to assist her, to be wishing to say something, to somebody, that would have relieved her. She sighed:
"I have come, Mamma . . . but I cannot stay long," she said. "I am very tired. There are all those business matters; and, though Adolph is very kind and sympathetic and is a great help, it is terribly complicated and I sometimes feel half-dead with it all. . . . It's lucky that I have Otto and Frances; I don't know what I should do without them . . . You know we are going to live in the country? . . ."
"You were thinking about it the other day, dear," said Mamma, anxiously, "but it wasn't decided yet . . . Bertha, must I lose you?"
