“I was detained so much longer abroad than I expected,” he began. “And we did not get in until Monday morning. I went to Barker’s Court, and could not learn where you were. Then I bethought myself of the cop at the square,” smiling as he designated the man.
“An’ he gev you my letter?”
“He gave me the letter. I hunted up the boys. I saw Patsey and Owen last night, and they are counting on your getting well. They sent you so much love. And to-day I went to Chester. Here are your roses.”
He tumbled them out all dewy from the wet papers. Oh, such sweetness! Dil breathed it in ecstatic delight. She had no words. She looked her unutterable joy out of her limpid brown eyes, and he had much ado to keep the tears from his. So pale, so spiritualized, yet so little like Bess, and—oh, the last hope died as he took in all the signs. For surely, surely she was on the road to heaven and Bess. No hand of love, no touch of prosperity, could hold her back.
“’Pears like everything’s come, an’ there ain’t nothin’ left to wish for,” she said as he laid her down again, and watched the transfigured face. “For now you c’n tell me ’bout Bess. Mother burned up the book one day, an’ we never could quite know, only she got crost the river, an’ they was all so glad at the pallis. An’ Bess was so sure you’d come. The cough was dreadful when we didn’t have some good medicine that helped her. An’ the lady come one afternoon, ’n’ mammy was home ’n’ she was norful sassy to her. You see, we hadn’t dast to tell mammy—”
“My poor child!” He was toying with the soft, tumbled hair. He had heard another side of the story, and of Mrs. Quinn’s insulting impudence.
“An’ then Bess she smelt the wild roses all around one night, an’ thought she was gettin’ better—an’—an’ she jus’ died.”
“Yes; God came for her in the night. He put his arms around her, and wrapped her in the garment of his great love, and took her through the pathway of the stars. She did not feel any cold nor pain, and he gave her a new, glorified body, so she could leave the poor old one behind.”
“But she wouldn’t have leaved me ’thout a word, when she loved me so, an’ wanted me to go to heaven with her.”
Dil’s lip quivered, and her chest heaved with the effort of keeping back the tears.