"Did he give you all this, my child?"
"They all did, Father; now you shall have soup and oranges."
"Thank you, sir—I'm sick, you see—all gone, sir!—had to send the poor child out, or we'd starve. God bless you, sir! I wish I was well enough to play you a tune," and he looked wistfully towards the corner where stood the old organ, baize-covered, the baize in tatters.
One month after that the two men met again as if by agreement, and walked slowly down town. Treading innumerable passages they came to the gloomy building where lived Carletta's father.
No—not lived there, for as they paused a moment out came two or three men bearing a pine coffin. In the coffin slept the old organ-grinder.
"It was very sudden, sir," said a woman, who recognized his benefactor. "Yesterday the little girl was took sick and it seemed as if he drooped right away. He died at six last night."
The two men went silently up stairs. The room was empty of everything save a bed, a chair and a nurse provided by John Harvey. The child lay there, not white, but pale as marble, with a strange polish on her brow.
"Well my little one, are you better?"
"Oh no, sir; Father is gone up there and I am going."
Up there! John Harvey turned unconsciously towards his friend.