"Can you not leave a dying man in peace?" he began savagely, but his wrath faded before the girl's mild glance. A brief spasm as of pain contracted his forehead, and his eyes closed.
"Have your foolish whim," he muttered at last, almost inaudibly. "But what have I to do with children? I always hated them."
"You will not hate Emmie," returned Queenie as she hurriedly rose; "it is a fine evening, and she pleaded for me to bring her; 'she wanted to see poor Uncle Andrew,' she said."
"Tell her not to call me that," he exclaimed, angrily; but Queenie had already closed the door behind her.
Another minute, and the child stood beside his couch. The evening sun shone full upon her; she had grown tall and thin from her long illness; the beautiful fair hair had been shaved off, but the soft yellow down peeped under the pretty cap border; the great blue eyes had a solemn, unchildlike look in them; a little wasted hand crept into the sick man's, and then patted it softly.
"Humph! so you are better, aye, after nearly frightening that sister of yours to death," with a milder growl than Queenie expected.
"I am much better, thank you, Uncle Andrew," returned Emmie, gravely; and then, perfectly undaunted by the grim, death-like face on the pillow before her, she clambered up on the bed beside it, and sat perched before him like a large soft-eyed bird. "Queenie thought I was going to die, and cried dreadfully every night; Cathy told me so. Are you going to die, Uncle Andrew?"
"It seems so," with a chord of ineffable bitterness rasping the thin voice.
Emmie leaned forward and stroked his face pityingly, with an old-fashioned womanliness that touched her sister greatly.
"I am so sorry; it seems such a pity, just as we were going to be fond of you; it will be so strange, too, missing you out of my prayers every night, not that it will do any harm to go on saying, 'God bless you,' even after you are dead," continued Emmie, reflectively, and in a slightly puzzled tone. "I asked Queenie about that, and she said she was not sure."