"Oh, don't!" I cried, and astonished my irate manager by bursting into tears. He instantly became gentle, and forcing a thimbleful of Chartreuse (which I loath) upon me, he once more asked what was the matter.
And then I told him of the dying emigrant—of Joe's feeling for me—of the singing of "the lament," and at Joe's words: "It's a message from the dying, or the dead."
Mr. Daly's fingers trembled like aspen leaves, his eyes dilated to perfect blackness, and almost he whispered the words: "Well, child—well?"
I told of the song, begun in sleep, continued in wakefulness to its wailing end, and then lost—utterly lost! And leaning his pale face eagerly toward me, Mr. Daly exclaimed: "He proved his words, good God! don't you see that—that air was his message to you? a message from the dying or the dead!" his fingers nervously sought the little amulet he wore.
"But," I objected, "he had been dead many hours before the song came to me?"
When, with the utmost conviction, he instantly answered: "Think how far you were asunder—what a distance he had to come to you!"
Being a very practical young person, a smile was rising to my lips, but a glance into his earnest eyes, that had become strange and mystic, checked it.
"I shall tell Father D——y of this," he said, half to himself, then, looking at me, he added: "The man loved you greatly, whatever he may have been, for you have received his message—whether it came from the man dying or the man dead. Go home, child; never mind about the scenes to-day—go home!"
And with that weird idea firmly fixed in his mind, he dismissed me.