“What have ye there, Misses Kelly, saving yer prisence?” inquired Mary Margaret, holding her baby poised in mid-air, and turning her kindly eyes upon the nurse. “It isn’t dead, sure?”
“She is,” answered the nurse, nodding her head toward the cot.
Mary Margaret held her breath, and tears stole to her eyes as she stood up, trembling beneath the weight of her infant—for she was still very feeble—and looked toward the pale face of the dead.
“And the poor, young crathur in the cot alongside, what has happened to her?” inquired Mary Margaret.
“She’s as good as dead, don’t you hear how she raves? Mutter—mutter, she hasn’t strength for more: all the doctors on earth couldn’t save her.”
“And her baby?” asked Mary Margaret, filled with compassion, and hugging her own child fondly to her bosom.
“Oh? that’s yonder by the dead woman, cold as she is!”
Mary Margaret held her child closer, and the tears streamed down her face.
“Give me a look at the motherless crathur,” she said, laying her child upon the cot, and reaching forth her arms.
The nurse hesitated an instant, and then flung back her apron from the face of the infant.