“My little Dil, what can I do for you?” he asked with tender solicitude.
A strange shudder seemed to run over her. Was it a premonition?
“I wish you’d take me in your strong arms ’n’ hold me. ’Pears if I’d like to be clost to some one, just sheltered like. An’ you an’ Miss Virginia sing ’bout ‘The rivers of delight.’”
John Travis lifted her up. She was so small and light; a child who was never to know any earthly joy or hope of girlhood, who would learn all the blessedness of life in the world to come. Virginia folded the soft blanket about her, and her face rested against the shoulder that would have been glad to bear a far heavier burthen for her. He took the cool little hands in his, and noted the fluttering, feeble pulse, the faint, irregular beating of the tired heart against his.
Sometimes both voices came to a pause through emotion. He remembered the other scene in the stuffy little room, and could see Bess’s enraptured face.
Then Dilsey Quinn gave a little start, and raised her head, turning her eyes to him.
“I c’n understand it all now,” she said joyously. “The Lord Jesus wanted me to wait till you come back, so I could tell Bess. An’, Miss Virginia, she’ll be so glad to know who gave the wild roses to Patsey. An’ you promised her—you’d come. We was all goin’ to heaven—together—”
The head dropped. The heart was still. The labor of the hands was done. The slow brain had the wisdom of the stars. But her eyes still kept the subtle glory; a radiance not of this world shone in her face as she left the night behind her and stepped into the dawn of everlasting life.
“She has seen Bess.”
Then John Travis laid her reverently on the cot, and sprinkled a baptism of roses over her. The two left behind, clasped hands, their whole lives sanctified by the brave sweetness and devotion of this one gone up to God.