“Mamma that was is there still, Meta,” he said, indicating the next room. “The spirit is gone to heaven; you know that: the body, that which you used to call mamma, will be here yet a little while, and then it will be laid by Uncle Thomas, to wait for the resurrection of the Last Day. Meta, if I should live to come home from India; that is, if I am in my native land when my time comes to die, they will lay me beside her—”
He stopped abruptly. Meta had lifted her head and was looking at him with a wild, questioning expression; as if she could not at first understand or believe his words. “Mamma is there?”
“Yes. But she is dead now, Meta; she is not living.”
“Oh, take me to her! Papa, take me to her!”
“Listen, Meta. Mamma is changed, she looks cold and white, and her eyes are shut, and she does not stir. I would take you in: but I fear—I don’t know whether you would like to look at her.”
But there might be no denial now that the hope had been given; the child would have broken her heart over it. George Godolphin rose; he pressed the little head upon his shoulder, and carried her to the door, the shawl well wound round her body, her warm feet hanging down. Once in the room, he laid his hand upon the golden curls, to insure that the face was not raised until he saw fit that it should be, and bore her straight to the head of the bed. Then, holding her in his arms very tightly that she might feel sensibly his protection, he suffered her to look full upon the white face lying there.
One glance, and Meta turned and buried her head upon him; he could feel her trembling; and he began to question his own wisdom in bringing her in. Another minute, and she looked back and took a longer gaze.
“That’s not mamma,” she said, bursting into tears.
George sat down on a chair close by, and laid her wet cheek against his, and hid his eyes amidst her curls. His emotion had spent itself in the long night, and he thought he could control it now.
“That is mamma, Meta; your mother and my dear wife. It is all that is left of her. Oh, Meta! if we had only known earlier that she was going to die!”