“Keep tight hold, darling,” the rattling voice was saying. “Don’t take it off till—another takes it—it will not be hard then.” Suddenly he saw Louis standing pale and straight at the foot of the bed.
“My good boy,” he faltered, “my good boy, God will bless—” His eyes closed again; paler and paler grew his face.
“Father!” cried Ruth in agony.
He looked toward her smiling.
“The sweetest word,” he murmured; “it was—my glory.”
Silence. A soul is passing; a simple, loving soul, giving no trouble in its passage; dropping the toils, expanding with infinity. Not utterly gone; immortality is assured us in the hearts that have touched ours.
Silence. A shadow falls, and Jules Levice’s work is done; and the first sunbeams crept about him, lay at his feet a moment, touched the quiet hands, fell on the head like a benediction, and rested there.
Chapter XXVII
“I thought you would be quiet at this hour,” said Rose Delano, seating herself opposite her friend in the library, the Thursday evening after the funeral. They looked so different even in the waning light,—Ruth in soft black, her white face shining like a lily above her sombre gown, Rose, like a bright firefly, perched on a cricket, her cheeks rosy, her eyes sparkling from walking against the sharp, cold wind.