“It doesn’t need much to keep me alive now, sir,” she said. “The cottage I can get for half a crown a week; and, of course, my sons are real good boys—they send me a little now and then.”
I gazed at her—at her wee, withered body, wasted away to nothing in tireless energy.
“You know you won’t care to leave off work when it comes to the time,” said I; “you’ll hate to have nothing to do.”
She looked back at me with a cunning twinkle in her bright brown eyes. As if she were fool enough to think that life would be bearable with nothing to do! As if she had ever dreamed that the hands could be idle while the heart was beating! As if she did not know that each must labour until death stilled them both!
“I shan’t have nothing to do, sir,” she said when she had said it already with her eyes. “Why, it’s just the time I’ve been looking for. I’m too busy now.”
“What are you going to do?” I asked.
“Make a patchwork quilt.”
“A patchwork quilt?”
“Yes.”
“What for?”