Dil moved about silently, and went frequently into her own room. The intense fervor and belief of the night had vanished. The court children straggled in and stared, half-afraid. The women said she was better off and out of her trouble; and now and then one spoke of her being in heaven.
She was not in heaven, Dil knew. And how could she be better off in the cold, hateful ground than in her warm, loving arms?
One gets strangely accustomed to the dear dead face. Dil paid it brief visits when no one else was by. A little change had come over it,—the inevitable change; but to Dil it seemed as if Bess was growing sorry that she had died; that the little shrinking everywhere meant regret.
Mrs. Quinn came back with a gift from her sympathetic customer, who imagined she had found heroic motherly devotion in this poor woman who had four children to care for. There were numberless visitors who gossiped and were treated to beer—there was quite a dinner, with an immense steak to grace the feast.
Presently a man came in and took the measure of the body, and then went up-stairs. An hour later a wagon stopped before the court, and two men shouldered a coffin. The small one went into the Quinns’. It was of stained wood with a muslin lining, and the little body was laid in its narrow home. Then the attendant went up-stairs, and some of the women followed. There was a confusion of voices, then the two men came lumbering down the winding stairs with their load, slid it into the wagon, while a curious throng gathered round in spite of the chill blast. They came up again, one man with a screwdriver in his hand.
“Take a look at her, Dil. Poor dear, she’s gone to her long rest.”
Mrs. Quinn pushed her forward. The women fell back a little. The man put down the coffin lid,—it was all in one piece,—and began to screw it down.
Dil gave a wild shriek as it closed over the pretty golden head, and would have dropped to the floor, but some one caught her. The man completed his task, picked up the burthen, it was so light; and when Dil came out of her faint Bess, with two other dead bodies, was being jolted over the stones to a pauper’s grave.
“Come now,” began Mrs. Quinn, “it’s full time ye wer sensible. She’s dead, an’ it’s a blissid relase, an’ she’s got no more suf’frin’ to go tru wid. It’s bin a hard thrial, an’ she not able to take a step this four year. Ye’d better go to bed an’ rist, for ye look quare ’bout the eyes. Ye kin have my bed if ye like.”
Dil shook her head, and tottered to her own little cot. “O Bess! Bess!” she cried in her heart, but her lips made no sound. How could people die who were not old nor sick? For she wanted to die, but she did not know how.