"They operated on him," said Sjaak. "They got the ash-can out of his brains. If he'd lived, then he'd 'a' walked again. He'd 'a' left the premises now, if he'd only lived."
"Come with me, Marjon," said Johannes; and he led her away. Then softly, "Shall we ask to see him—now?"
Marjon, pale as death, but calm, replied: "Not I, Jo. I want to keep the living picture before me as a last remembrance, not the dead one."
Johannes, as pale as she, silently acquiesced.
Then he went to the head nurse and asked, softly and modestly:
"When is the funeral to be, Sister?"
The Sister, a small, trim, pale and spectacled lady, with a rather sour but yet not heartless face, gave the two a swift glance, and said, somewhat nervously and hurriedly:
"Oh, you mean number seven, do you not? Yes? Well, we know nothing about him. There is indeed no family, is there? There was no statement of birth—no ticket of removal—nothing. There is—ah ... there is to be no funeral."
"No funeral, Sister!" exclaimed Marjon. "But what then? What—what is to be done with ... with him?"
Then the nurse, with a scientific severity probably more cruel than she purposed, said: