"A shock?" said Henry. Sylvia echoed him. "A shock!" she gasped. "Yes, I thought you hadn't heard of it." "I've been in the house all day," said Sylvia. "I hadn't seen a soul before you came in." She rose. "Who's taking care of her?" she asked. "She ain't all alone?" "Sit down," said Sidney. "She's well cared for. Miss Babcock is there. She happened to be out of a place, and Dr. Wallace got her right away." "Is she going to get over it?" asked Sylvia, anxiously. "I must go over there, anyway, this evening. I always thought a good deal of Abrahama." "You might as well go over there," said the lawyer. "It isn't quite the thing for me to tell you, but I'm going to. If Henry here can eat flapjacks like those you make, Sylvia, and not say grace, his state of mind is dangerous. I am going to tell you. Dr. Wallace says Abrahama can't live more than a day or two, and -- she has made a will and left you all her property."

Author Biography

Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman (1852 - 1930) was a prominent 19th-century American author. Freeman began writing stories and verse for children while still a teenager to help support her family and was quickly successful. Her career as a short story writer launched in 1881 when she took first place in a short story contest with her submission "The Ghost Family." When the supernatural caught her interest, the result was a group of short stories which combined domestic realism with supernaturalism and these have proved very influential. Her best known work was written in the 1880s and 1890s while she lived in Randolph. She produced more than two dozen volumes of published short stories and novels. She is best known for two collections of stories, A Humble Romance and Other Stories (1887) and A New England Nun and Other Stories (1891). Her stories deal mostly with New England life and are among the best of their kind. Freeman is also remembered for her novel Pembroke (1894) and she contributed a notable chapter to the collaborative novel The Whole Family (1908).