She was so quiet, no one noticed when she stole into the room where her friend lay dying. Mary knelt on one side of the bed, Martha on the other, watching the breath come slower and slower, and clinging to the unresponsive hands as if their love could draw him back to life.
Neither shed a tear, but seemed to watch with their souls in their eyes, for one more word, one more look of recognition.
Abigail sat by the window, weeping softly. Ruth had never seen her mother cry before, and it frightened her. She glanced at her grandfather, standing by the foot of the bed; two great tears rolled slowly down his cheeks, and dropped on his long beard.
A sudden cry from Mary, as she fell fainting to the floor, called her attention to the bed again. Martha was silently rocking herself to and fro, in an agony of grief.
Still the child did not understand. Those in the room were so busy trying to bring Mary back to consciousness, that no one noticed Ruth.
Drawn by some impulse she could not understand, the child drew nearer and nearer. Then she laid her soft little hand on his, thinking the touch would surely make him open his eyes and smile at her again; it had often done so before.
But what was it that made her start back terrified, and shrink away trembling? It was not Lazarus she had touched, but the awful mystery of death.
"I did not know that a little child could feel so deeply," said Abigail to her mother, when she found that Ruth neither ate nor played, but wandered aimlessly around.
"I shall keep her away from the funeral."
But all her care could not keep from the little one's ears the mournful music of the funeral dirge, or the wailing of the mourners, who gathered to do honor to the young man whom all Bethany knew and loved.