Supposing she should die! Men and women died frequently in Paradise Court. Their bodies were carried out of the squalid dwellings and rattled over the streets to the crowded burial ground. The thought smote him painfully, and made a burning flush mount to his face. She must not die! What would riches and greatness mean to him unless she were there to share in his good fortune?
II.
The geranium was not at all happy in her new quarters. Although George attended to her wants most carefully she still thought with bitter regret of the greenhouse where she had been reared, and of the old gardener who had ministered to her. Here on the window sill of George's attic thousands of smuts settled daily upon her leaves, and the air was heavy. So great was her discomfort that she would have most certainly ceased to live had not a sunbeam lost his way among the narrow courts of the city, and while darting in and out of the grimy streets in his endeavours to find the sun, espied the unhappy flower. He immediately climbed up his golden ladder, and rested among the broad green leaves, much to her delight.
She confided her pitiful history to this new-found friend,
who was so kind and sympathetic that the geranium grew warm and happy. Presently the sun shone out in the murky sky, and immediately the sunbeam glided along his golden thread and rejoined his parent. He did not, however, forsake the plant which had sheltered him, but frequently visited her, so that she forgot her struggle for life, and grew into a fine healthy geranium, much to the delight of her young master.
As time passed George began to realise that his mother would never rise from her bed again. Father Francis had gently told him that there was little hope of her recovery, and that when the great blow fell upon him he must reconcile himself to the will of the Almighty.
The poor waif suffered many hours of agony alone in his garret. Kneeling before the crucifix, he would beg God to spare the one thing he loved in all the world.
"I have so few comforts, dear Lord," he would say, "no clothes, little food; I can stand want if only you will not take her away." But when he was tired out with pain, he would raise his lips to the pierced feet, and kissing them, murmur, "Thy will be done."
His imagination had so often realised the picture that one morning, on finding his mother dead in her bed, he was hardly shocked.