Her delicate complexion was delicate to the utmost refinement; her beautiful soft eyes were larger than they had ever seemed, even in childhood; her lovely face was lovelier than ever, with an angelic purity and beauty.
Then she told him the truth; but, indeed, he saw it for himself.
"Mary, dearest," said he, "if there is a little bit of life left only to you, let it be to me also."
"Dick, I can but be a burden."
"That—never—a joy as long as you are with me. Give me the one thing I have thought of, worked for, if it be but for a year or two."
"A year or two! Oh, Dick, only perhaps a month."
"Then let this month be our honeymoon."
And so it was.
The faithful fellow, true to everyone with whom he was brought in contact, was true to his dying love. She came, ghostlike, to church, and I shall never forget the pathos, the tenderness, the sincerity with which each took the irrevocable vows which bound in one the ebbing scrap of one life with the flowing vigour of the other.