“I knew it. It is her dear, impulsive,
affectionate way. I knew it without asking,
but I wanted to hear you say it. The petted wife
knows she is loved, but she makes her husband tell
her so every day, just for the joy of hearing it.
. . . She used the pen this time. That
is better; the pencil-marks could rub out, and I should
grieve for that. Did you suggest that she use
the pen?”
“Y—no—she—it
was her own idea.”
The mother looked her pleasure, and said:
“I was hoping you would say that. There
was never such a dear and thoughtful child! . . .
Aunt Hannah?”
“Dear Margaret?”
“Go and tell her I think of her all the time,
and worship her.
Why—you are crying again. Don’t
be so worried about me, dear;
I think there is nothing to fear, yet.”
The grieving messenger carried her message, and piously
delivered it to unheeding ears. The girl babbled
on unaware; looking up at her with wondering and startled
eyes flaming with fever, eyes in which was no light
of recognition:
“Are you—no, you are not my mother.
I want her—oh, I want her! She was
here a minute ago—I did not see her go.
Will she come? will she come quickly? will she come
now? . . . There are so many houses . . . and
they oppress me so . . . and everything whirls and
turns and whirls . . . oh, my head, my head!”—and
so she wandered on and on, in her pain, flitting from
one torturing fancy to another, and tossing her arms
about in a weary and ceaseless persecution of unrest.
Poor old Hannah wetted the parched lips and softly
stroked the hot brow, murmuring endearing and pitying
words, and thanking the Father of all that the mother
was happy and did not know.
Daily the child sank lower and steadily lower towards
the grave, and daily the sorrowing old watchers carried
gilded tidings of her radiant health and loveliness
to the happy mother, whose pilgrimage was also now
nearing its end. And daily they forged loving
and cheery notes in the child’s hand, and stood
by with remorseful consciences and bleeding hearts,
and wept to see the grateful mother devour them and
adore them and treasure them away as things beyond
price, because of their sweet source, and sacred because
her child’s hand had touched them.
At last came that kindly friend who brings healing
and peace to all. The lights were burning low.
In the solemn hush which precedes the dawn vague
figures flitted soundless along the dim hall and gathered
silent and awed in Helen’s chamber, and grouped
themselves about her bed, for a warning had gone forth,
and they knew. The dying girl lay with closed
lids, and unconscious, the drapery upon her breast
faintly rising and falling as her wasting life ebbed
away. At intervals a sigh or a muffled sob broke
upon the stillness. The same haunting thought
was in all minds there: the pity of this death,
the going out into the great darkness, and the mother
not here to help and hearten and bless.
