"My girlies," she murmured, and she feebly stroked their sunburnt faces, as they bent over her, and kissed her passionately. "I am so glad--you had--a nice holiday--before--this trouble--came. Don't cry--my darlings--Jesus is--very precious--and He--will bring--all my dear ones--to me--some day." And then she stopped, for her breath was coming in quick, short pantings, and the pulse, upon which Dr. Franklyn had his finger, was only feebly fluttering.
"Don't exert yourself too much, my dear," he said tenderly, with anguish in his eyes.
A radiant smile passed over the dying woman's worn features, and she lay back, exhausted. "I will--rest--a little," she whispered. For she hoped to recover sufficient strength to speak a last word to these two of her children and Dick, who could not arrive for some hours.
But it was not to be. The gentle sleep into which she presently fell, and which seemed as if it must be doing her good, deepened into that last, long, slumber that knows no awakening in this life, and Mary Franklyn passed into the presence of the King.
The sorrow and sadness in that household during the days that followed can be more easily imagined than described. Lois, Kathleen, and Roger endeavoured to be brave and forgetful of self, as they strove to comfort their father and the younger ones.
Dick, who arrived home a couple of hours after his mother had breathed her last, was inconsolable. He had adored his gentle, fragile mother, and it was heart-breaking to see the erstwhile merry whistler wandering listlessly and silently about the house; or to come upon him, unawares, in some quiet spot whither he had fled in order to indulge his grief unseen. Roger, who had always been his chum in a way that brothers seldom are, now became his comforter; and it was during those sad, sorrowful days, when the younger lad's heart was rendered impressionable by grief, that he began to seek the Saviour whom Roger had lately found, and whom their mother had loved so dearly.
Elsa bore up bravely, after the first terrible outburst, and was very helpful in looking after Joan and Paddy, who fretted for their mother a great deal. But Olive seemed turned to stone. She realised that in the bargain she had sought to make with God she had been worsted! He might have spared her mother; He might have heard her cry: and she would have kept her promise if He had! But He was cruel, oh! so cruel, to snatch her mother away without giving her a chance even to whisper that she was sorry for all the anxiety she had caused her, and that she would be a better girl, in future, if her mother would only say she forgave her. Both Lois and Kathleen sought to break down the stoical reserve, behind which Olive hid her real feelings, but she always repulsed them, and they could only hope that, in time, God would answer their mother's many prayers for her wilful little daughter.
CHAPTER XX.
"KEEP IT UP, IT ANSWERS VERY WELL."
A few days after Mrs. Franklyn's funeral, Monica Beauchamp, looking very fresh and dainty in a pretty linen frock and straw hat was walking up the shady road leading from the town to The Cedars, Mr. Howell's residence.