Ilse slept that night, though Palla scarcely closed her eyes. Dreadful details of the coming day rose up to haunt her––all the ghastly routine necessary before the dead lie finally undisturbed by the stir and movement of many footsteps––the coming and going of the living.
Because what they called pneumonia was the Black Death of the ancient East, they had warned Ilse to remain aloof from that inert thing that had been her lover. So she did not look upon his face again.
There were relatives of sorts at the chapel. None spoke to her. The sunshine on the flower-covered casket was almost spring like.
And in the cemetery, too, there was no snow; and, under the dead grass, everywhere new herbage tinted the earth with delicate green.
Ilse returned from the cemetery with Palla. Her black veil and garments made of her gold hair and blond skin a vivid beauty that grief had not subdued.
That deathless courage which was part of her seemed 327 to sustain the clear glow of her body’s vigour as it upheld her dauntless spirit.
“Did you see Jim in the chapel?” she asked quietly.
Palla nodded. She had seen Marya, also. After a little while Ilse said gravely: