“God send that I bear the burden for long and many’s a day yet,” said the woman. “Ye’ve been a guid frien’ to me, Norah, and I feel happy workin’ awa here by yer side. Ye’ll get better too, for when Dermod comes ye’ll be happy, and the happy live long.”
Norah put out her hand and grasped that of her friend. “God bless ye, Ellen,” she said. “Ye’ve been more’n a mother to me. But I’m not long for this world now. Something tells me that I’m for another place. I’m not afeared to die, Ellen; why should I? But sorrow is on me because I’m leavin’ you.”
The darkness fell; the two women were silent, their hands clasped tightly and their eyes full of tears. But with them was a certain strange happiness; one bright thought joined another bright thought in their minds just as the beams of a newly-lit fire join together in a darkened room.
Norah fell asleep. The lamp, which had become leaky, had now gone out. Ellen lit a candle, stuck it into the neck of a bottle and placed the bottle on the floor. The place looked desolate and forbidding; dead ashes lay in the fireplace; a pile of rags—Ellen’s bed—lay in the corner. There was no picture in the place, nothing to lessen the monotony save the little crucifix on the mantelpiece, and this relieving feature was a symbol of sorrow.
Ellen glanced at the sleeper. How strangely beautiful she looked now! It seemed as if something spiritual and divine had entered the body of Norah, causing her to look more like the creation of some delightful dream than an erring human being bowed with a weight of sorrow.
“I’ll go out and get some coals,” said Ellen, speaking under her breath. “Then we’ll have a cheerful fire for Dermod Flynn when he comes. He was sic a comely lad when in Jim Scanlon’s squad. And poor Norah! Ah! it’s sic a pity the way things work out in this life. There seems to be a bad management of things somewhere.”
CHAPTER XXXV
THE FAREWELL MEETING
I
FOR the rest of that evening, between short periods of sleep, one bright vision merged with another in front of Norah’s eyes, and in every vision the face of Dermod Flynn stood out distinctly clear. She spoke to him; talked of home, of the people whom both had known, of the master of Glenmornan schoolhouse, of Maire a Glan, of Micky’s Jim and the squad, Willie the Duck, and all those whom they had known so well a few short years before. But for all she spoke, Dermod never answered; he looked at her in silence where she lay, the life passing from her as a spent fountain weakens, as an echo dies away.
The candle threw out a fitful flame in the room, shadows rushed together on the ceiling, forming and breaking free, dancing and capering in strange antics. Steps could be heard on the stairs; the tap was running outside and the water fell with a hissing sound. Ellen was still out; the room was deserted; nothing there but the shadows on the ceiling and the sick girl on the bed by the window.