Christian life -- Fiction; Farm life -- Fiction; New England -- Fiction
"Smooth up the bed a little, and let us lay him there!" said the
driver, becoming impatient with the delay.
"Not there--_she_ will come back--she could not go far--on my bed--lay
him here, on my bed and Isabel's. It is made up--no one slept in it
last night!" exclaimed Mary, opening the door of her little room.
They laid poor Chester upon the bed that his noble benevolence had
supplied to the orphan who stood weeping over him. The rustle of that
poor straw, as it shrunk to meet his body, was a nobler tribute to
his memory than a thousand minute guns could have been.
They were about to arrange his head upon the bolster, but Mary went
into the next room, in haste, and brought forth the pillow which still
revealed the pressure that Mrs. Chester had left upon it.
"Lay him upon her pillow," said the child. "He would have asked for
it, I know."
Those stout men looked upon the child with a feeling of profound
respect. They drew back, and allowed her to arrange the death-couch
according to her own will. She could not bear the stiff and rigid
position in which they had placed him, but laid the hands gently and
naturally down. When she turned away, the cold look had been softened
somewhat, and in the solemn repose of death there was blended the
sweetness of that calm, deep slumber, when the soul is dreaming of
Heaven.
The three men went forth, and Mary followed them, closing the door
reverently after her.
"I must stay with him," she said, "Mrs. Chester and Isabel are gone;
he must not be left alone, or I ought to go in search of them. She
was very, very ill, and out of her head I am afraid, and poor Isabel
is only a little girl that would not know what to do!"
"I will search for them," said one of the policemen, kindly. "Stay
here till some one comes--I am far more certain to find them than
such a little thing as you would be."
They left the child alone. For a little time she sat down and wept,
but her grief was not of a kind to waste itself in tears, while
anything remained undone that could give comfort to others.
"They will bring her back--they will both come," she said, inly,
checking her tears. "I will make up her bed, and find something for
Isabel to eat; she had no breakfast, and did not relish the bread
last night. If they find everything snug and tidy it will not seem
so bad."
So the little girl went to work, putting everything in its place,
and noiselessly removing the dust that had settled on the scant
furniture. Alas, there was not much for her to do, for those desolated
rooms contained few of the comforts that had once rendered them so
cheerful. When the bed was arranged and the outer room swept, Mary
sat down a moment, for grief and watching rendered her very weary,
and she was so young that the profound stillness appalled her. Then
there came a faint knock at the door, and she was arising to open
it when Joseph stood on the threshold.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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