He spoke as though the very presence of it were in the room with them then; she glanced at him, but did not speak.
"When I heard it first I—I was afraid. Life seemed so big and strong; it was all about me—throbbing and pulsing and striving—as I came out from where they'd examined me. Men were laughing and striding along, and speaking to each other—men with years of life before them; I stood in a great city, with death hard at my elbow. In quite a little time I was to leave everything behind—I was to go out into the shadows. Oh—I can tell you I was afraid!" He laughed now at that odd recollection—laughed shamefacedly.
"But not now?" It was the first time she had spoken since he began; she spoke in a whisper.
He shook his head. "Not for myself; the fear has gone," he said. "It will only be a sort of falling asleep. If ever I grow afraid again, it will be when I think about it in the sunlight. For I love the sunlight. It isn't for myself—but oh, my God—what of the babies?"
He beat one fist softly into the palm of the other hand, and bit his lips, and looked at her wide-eyed. She felt that she had got to the very heart of the matter now; she was on surer ground. Already she looked upon the man as someone gone beyond her—someone to be spoken of with bated breath; but the children appealed to her practical mind; she probed deep down to the very source of the trouble that oppressed him. Death was a thing to be met full front; but young lives were wrapped up with the failing life of Old Paul, and he did not know what was to happen to them.
"There'll be those who'll give a care to them," she suggested, with her own mind already making up to speak to Baffall about it on the morrow.
"You see, I gathered them about me so light-heartedly," said the man, "there was no thought about the future. I think I'd got an idea that we were going to live in this place for ever—without changing—almost without growing up. Silly—wasn't it?" He laughed feebly, and shook his head at that folly that was done with. "And yet I meant it for the best. Jimmy, now, could look after himself; boys are different. But it's the—the girls."
"Oh—I know, my dear—I know!" whispered the old woman, thrusting back a lock of grey hair from her forehead, and looking perplexedly at the fire. "But you can appoint guardians—people to look after them—and to look after the money?"
"Oh, yes, I shall do all that," he said. "That's the first thing I shall set about doing; I'll leave everything square and straight; trust me for that. It seems strange I should be arranging things like this—doesn't it? I think yesterday—or even this morning, for the matter of that—I wanted to live quite a long time. Now it doesn't seem to matter so much—except—except for the children." He waved his hand indefinitely, and smiled upon her with a wan smile.
"It would have been worse for you, dear—the going would have been worse, I mean—except for the babies," she reminded him gently. "That seems to me the best of it; several of 'em to be sorry—more sorry than most. Now, when it comes to my time——"