The poor creature looked for a full minute into the kind old face above her, and then slowly the look of wonder in her eyes gave place to one of firmness, pain and sorrow, and the lips closed tightly, as though in fear that her secret would get out.
"Oh honey, don't look like that, don't. Tell us who you are. Have you no mother? I know you have. Let us send for her at once, that she may come to you."
The lips parted in a sweet, sad smile. "I'm going to die then?
You would not look so if I were not. Oh, I am so glad, so glad."
And in a moment she was sleeping like a child.
"Poor girl," muttered Doctor Jordan, wiping his own eyes. Very sharp professional eyes they were too. "I fear you will have to take her mother's place. I must go now, but I will look in again during the day. Don't have any false hopes; there is nothing to be done, save to make the end easy."
For an hour the stranger slept, with a smile on her lips; and then opened her eyes again. But there was no pain, no fear in them now; only just a shadow of trouble, as she asked in a whisper, "Where is it?"
The woman, with one hand smoothed back the hair from the forehead of her patient, and with the other pointed upward; the troubled shadow passed from the eyes of the young mother, and she slept again. Later in the day, the doctor called, and once more she awoke.
"I thank you, doctor," she said, in a weak voice; but shook her head when he offered her medicine.
"But, dear child, it is only to relieve you from any pain."
She answered, "you said I must go; let me go as I am. Oh, this world is cold and harsh. God knows that I do not fear to die. Christ, who welcomed little children, has my babe, and he knows that in my heart I am innocent."
"But won't you tell us of your friends?"