"My husband, my dear husband!" she said, casting a look full of feeling upon Squire John.
Her husband rejoiced within himself, thinking
it a sign of amendment; but the doctor shook his head, he knew it was a sign of death.
Next, the sick woman turned towards Flora. Her friend guessed the meaning of her inquiring look, and held the little child nestling on her bosom to the sick woman's lips. Fanny tenderly strained it to her heaving breast, and kissed the face of the sleeping child, who at every kiss opened its dark-blue eyes, and then drooped them and went on sleeping again.
The mother put it back on Flora's breast, and, pressing the lady's hand, whispered to her—
"Be a mother to my child."
Flora could not reply, but she nodded her head. Not a sound would come to her lips, and she turned her head aside, lest the dying woman should see the tears in her eyes.
Then Fanny folded her hands together on her breast, and murmured the single prayer which she had been taught to say in her childhood—
"O God, my God, be merciful to me, poor sinful girl, now and for evermore. Amen."
Then she cast down her eyes gently, and fell asleep.