A group of “somewhat drunk” young men sat upon the cellar door in McGarragles’ Alley, howling out a popular song between pulls at a can of beer. Goose McGonagle, who was passing, paused and regarded them disdainfully.
“Did somebody hit youse mugs with a bar rag!” demanded he. “Ain’t none o’ youse got no sense? Here’s Mary Carroll a-dyin’ and youse people raisin’ hell almost under the window.”
The singing stopped; the young roughs had always taken off their hats to Mary, a degree of reverence that they showed no one else, except, perhaps, young Father Dawson; and Goose passed on, confident that their uproar for that night, at least, was done.
And so it went through all the neighbourhood; in every court and alley the news was known; in every kitchen and on every street corner it was talked of.
Mike McCarty heard it while stripping the harness from his horses’ backs in Shannon’s stables; Tim Burns was told of it while still on his way from work; and it was the first thing that fell upon the ears of Danny Casey as he entered his mother’s house.
“Mary’s dyin’,” trembled upon every lip that had smiled in answer to her kindness; and as the night grew old, a hush seemed to fall over the district; the very moon, as it sailed across the sky, attended by myriads of stars, seemed to blink solemnly down, and ponder sadly.
Yes, the serene, white soul was passing; the shadow of the death angel’s wings had fallen across the bed where Mary lay. Larry sat near the window, his arm thrown along the back of the chair, his forehead resting upon it; Rosie, the only other person in the room, wiped the death damp from the pale brow, her eyes bright with tears.
“Don’t take it so hard, Larry,” whispered the sick girl. “It had to come, you know, and you’ll be happy, afterward.”
Happy! With a return of the old bare life—the rough, purposeless life that she had made bloom with new thoughts? He would drift back to the old conditions; there would be nothing to keep him from it when her gentle influence had relaxed. And that “afterward” of which she spoke so often, and so hopefully! It would be black and barren enough, his heart whispered to him—she would be where her voice could not reach him and he would be alone with his sorrow.
A picture of the crucifixion hung upon the wall; a slanting ray from the dim light brought out the world’s great tragedy with piteous distinctness. But the lesson brought no consolation to Larry. He looked at the picture with vacant eyes, for his brain was numb, and he could think of nothing but his impending loss. Philosophy is a meaningless word to such as he; for they who grapple with poverty, and go wrestling through a gloom from birth to death, find it hard to submit.