Original Penny Readings: A Series of Short Sketches

by George Manville Fenn

I went on to the cottage, and then found that the news had been less tardy than myself, for the servant girl had heard it in the town an hour before, and told them upon her return.

Upon hearing the fatal tidings poor Annie had gently slipped from her chair, and remained insensible for some time, but the doctor was then with her.

One, two, three sad days passed, and on the fourth I stood on one side of her bed with my knees trembling beneath me; for young and inexperienced as I then was, I knew that an awful change was taking place. It was evening, and the setting sun sent a glow of unearthly brightness to her sweet calm face as I stood there half blind with tears, while my poor aunt sobbed audibly.

But why prolong the sad tale? Once the dying girl opened her eyes and smiled upon her mother, and then turned them towards me, when her pale lips formed themselves to kiss me, even as would those of a child. I leant over her, and pressed my lips to hers, and as I did so, there was a faint sigh, and I felt myself drawn away.

Five days after I again stood to take a farewell look of poor Annie as she lay in the dim shadowy room in her narrow coffin, with her crossed arms folding a tiny form to her breast. Cold—cold—cold! Mother and child. The breast that should have warmed the little bud, icy—pulseless; and as I stood there with a strange awe upon me, I could but whisper, for they seemed to sleep.

We laid them where you stood to-night, love; and on returning, sad and broken-hearted, to the little parlour—now so lonely and deserted, we found that Ellen the servant had suddenly left; and that, too, without assigning any reason. But we had too much to think of then to pay attention to a domestic inconvenience, though often afterwards it was recalled.

I dared not trust myself to convey the sad news to my brother, for as yet he was in ignorance of poor Annie’s death. We had kept it back, hesitating whether to tell him at all at such a time, when sorrow had bowed him down; but at length I wrote to him, and with a letter from my aunt, inclosed it to the chaplain of the county gaol, begging of him to try and prepare my poor brother for the dreadful shock.

I felt now that we had all drained the cup of bitterness; and in the incidents of the past month, years upon years seemed to have been added to my life. But the dregs of the cup had yet to be partaken of; for on the second day after sending my letter, I was summoned to see my brother, and I went with foreboding at my heart, and a voice seeming to whisper to me—“Thank God that you are orphans!”

Upon reaching the prison I was shown into the chaplain’s private room, and his looks told me what his first words confirmed. He spoke long and earnestly, and with a tender sympathy I could not have expected. But at last I begged that I might see my poor brother, and he led me to his cell.

Coming from the bright glare of a sunlit room, it was some time before my eyes became accustomed to the half twilight of the bar-windowed cell; and then, half blind with tears, but with my eyes hot and burning, I looked upon the pallid bloodless form of poor Fred, for he was found on the previous night just as he breathed his last sigh in the words, “Annie—pardon!”—having forestalled the will of God by his own hand.