"Dear father!" exclaimed Edith. "He is far from well. I hope this relapse will be shorter than the last. I think mother bears these spells wonderfully well, don't you?"
He met her direct questioning glance, and he dared not meet it with an untruth. He must tell her now—there was no alternative.
"Would you not be glad when the time comes that will free your mother from these awful spells of agony? If she lives, she cannot be free."
"O, you do think there is doubt of her final recovery?" she asked fearfully.
"I do, indeed. How thankful we ought to be to have her at rest," he replied.
They were about to leave the house. She would need time to calm herself before going to her new scene of grief.
He drew her arm through his and gazed down into her face with a great fondness.
"Dear girl, be brave. You must meet the inevitable with all the resistance of your womanhood."
He waited for her to speak, but she was looking up at him in dumb despair.
His whole heart seemed conveyed in his next words. "Edith, as I entered your old home, your mother passed to rest."