Margaret Dornham and the little child sat waiting for him when the sad
procession stopped at the door.
"The doctor is dead!" was the cry from one to another.
A terrible pain shot through Margaret's head. Dead! The kindly man, who
had been her only friend, dead! Then perhaps the child would be taken
from her, and she should see it no more!
An impulse, for which she could hardly account, and for which she was
hardly responsible, seized her. She must have the box that contained the
papers, lest, finding the papers, people should rob her of the child.
Quick as thought, she seized the box--which always stood on a bracket in
the drawing-room--and hid it under her shawl. To the end of her life she
was puzzled as to why she had done this. It would not be missed, she
knew, in the confusion that was likely to ensue. She felt sure, also,
that no one, save herself and the child's father, knew of its contents.
She did not wait long in that scene of confusion and sorrow. Clasping
the child in her arms, lest she should see the dead face, Margaret
Dornham hurried back to the cottage, bearing with her the proofs of the
child's identity.
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