“Promise me that you will not give them my little one when I am gone. You are good, and will be kind to her. Oh, will you not? I would not be happy, I could not rest in peace if she were sent to—to him.” Her words rambled off again. “I left him,” she said, “ran away—far away, far away, and the country was all strange to me, and I could not find my way. Every one stared at me; it must have been because I had gone mad, you know, quite mad. All women do. I wanted to put a great distance between us, to get beyond his sight—beyond the sound of his voice, beyond—”
“Ah, do not speak more,” entreated Aoi, now in tears.
“Why, you are crying!” said the sick woman, looking wistfully into Aoi’s face. She began to weep, weakly, impotently, herself.
After a time she became quieter. She started once again, when Aoi had snuffed a few of the lights, seeming to dread the darkness, but when the Japanese woman’s hands reassured her, she was again silent. And as she slept she still clung spasmodically to the hands of Aoi.
IV
Morning dawned with a haggard light. Ceaselessly the rain drizzled down. The torpid heat of the previous day had given place to a clammy chilliness. The weather oppressed the sick one. Her restlessness was gone, but passive quiet was more ominous. Her white face seemed to have shrunken through the night—so white and still it was that she seemed scarcely to breathe.
Too weak to bear the burden of her child against her, the mother permitted the little one to be cared for in an interior room lest its cries might disturb her. All through the day she spoke no word. Wearily, the heavy lids of her eyes were closed.