“Don’t forget, Francis—never forget—that it is a journey we must enter on, sooner or later.”
“An uncertain and unknown journey at the best!” he said. “You have no fear of it?”
“Fear! No, but I had once.”
She spoke the words in a low, sweet tone, and pointed with a smile to the book that still lay open on the table. Francis’s eyes fell on the page.
“When death is drawing near,
And thy heart shrinks with fear,
And thy limbs fail,
Then raise thy hands and pray
To Him who cheers the way
Through the dark vale.
“Seest thou the eastern dawn?
Hears’t thou, in the red morn,
The angel’s song?
Oh! lift thy drooping head,
Thou who in gloom and dread
Hast lain so long.
“Death comes to set thee free;
Oh! meet him cheerily,
As thy true friend;
And all thy fears shall cease,
And in eternal peace
Thy penance end.”
Francis sat very still, struggling a little with that lump in his throat. She leaned forward, and let her head rest upon him, just as she had done the other day when he first came in. His emotion broke loose then.
“Oh, mother, what shall I do without you?”
“You will have God,” she whispered.