'Were you not able to do anything to ...'
'No, I was able to do nothing,' the doctor said, beaten, holding out his arms as he owned to the most horrible of his failures.
The old man, his face now rigid in tragic expression, was not crying. Like a child who is not to be comforted, Dr. Amati took him by the hand, lifted him from his chair, and said gently:
'Come and see her.'
They went. The Marchesina di Formosa Bianca Maria Cavalcanti was lying on her small white bed, her head rather sloping on one shoulder, the waxen hands, with discoloured fingers, clasped over a rosary. A soft white robe had been put over her wasted body. The violet-shaded mouth was half open, the clayey eyelids lowered. She seemed very much smaller, like a girl in her teens. On her face there was only the haughty seal of death, that soothes all and forgives all. It was not serenity, but peace.
From the doorway the two men gazed on the small figure, with long, black hair flowing over it. They did not go in; motionless, both kept their eyes on the mortal remains, and Amati repeated gently, as if to himself, like a child whom nothing could comfort:
'There should be flowers—flowers....'
The old man did not hear him. He looked at his dead daughter, saying not a word, giving no sigh; he bent his great frame and knelt down in the doorway, holding out his arms for forgiveness, like old Lear before the sweet corpse of Cordelia.
THE END
BILLING AND SONS, LTD., PRINTERS, GUILDFORD