'Will you take it off before I lie down?' she asked, pointing to the handkerchief.
'No, madam.'
She began to feel for the block, asking, 'Where is it?'
Some one guided her to it, and saying, 'Lord, into Thy hands I commend my spirit,' she laid down her head, which at one stroke was severed from her body.
* * * * *
'All is over!' I cried miserably, as I recovered from another illness, to find myself being tended by Mistress Ellen, in a poor lodging in Fleet Street. 'There is nothing left—nothing!'
'There is God,' said my companion.
It was the first time I had ever heard her speak of Him, or indeed of religion, for she always averred that to do is better than to talk; therefore her three words now made all the more impression.
'He has taken my dear lady,' sobbed I rebelliously.
'He gave her to us in the first instance,' was the reply. 'And I know,' gently added the good woman, 'that He has taken her through a quick, though painful, door into the glory beyond. There, doubtless, her joy is so extreme as to have caused her already to forget the pain that went before, and there it behoves us to try and follow her.'