“I do miss Owny so,” he half whimpered. “Ther’ ain’t a boy in the street who could think up such roarin’ fun.”
“Whisht!” Dil said softly. “Bess is asleep, an’ I won’t have her worrited. She had a bad time yist’day with the babies. I do hope there won’t be no such crowd to-day. Seven babies an’ that was thirty-five cents. Mother might be given Bess an’ me some Christmas.”
Dan laughed at that.
Dil sighed. She drank a little coffee, but she could not eat. Two sleepy babies came. She washed the dishes, and spread up her mother’s bed, putting the babies in there. It was dark, with no ventilation but the door, and kept warm easily.
Another and another baby, one crying for its mother. When Dil had hushed it she took a vague glance at Bess, whose fair head lay there so restful. The frost was melting off the window-panes, and she put out the lamp. With a baby in her arms she sat down and rocked.
A curious sense of something, not quite anxiety, came over her presently. She went to Bess and raised the blanket, peering at the small white face that seemed almost to light the obscurity of the room. The eyes were half-closed. The lips were parted with a smile, and the little white teeth just showed. One hand seemed to hold up the chin.
Dil stooped and kissed her. O God! what was it? What was it? For Bess was marble cold.
“O Bess, Bess!” she cried in mortal terror. “Wake up, my darlin’! Wake up an’ get warm.”
As she seized the hand, a startling change came over the child. The chin dropped. The pretty smile was gone. The eyes looked out with awesome fixedness. Her heart stood still as if she were frozen.
Then, moved by horror, she flew up-stairs, her breath almost strangling her.