They were in the big, bare office of the hotel. The August sunshine lay dim upon the dingy window-panes; the walls, stained by years of smoke and grime, were hidden by yellowing advertisements of reapers and horse liniments; in the centre was a dirty iron stove. A poor, gaunt room, but a haven to Nathaniel May, awaiting the end of hope.
“I heard,” Lizzie Graham said; she leaned forward and stroked his hand. “But maybe you can finish it at the Farm, Nathaniel?”
“No,” he said, sadly; “no; I know what it’s like at the Farm. There is no room there for anything but bodies. No time for anything but Death.”
“How long would it take you to put it together?” she asked; and Dyer, who was lounging across his counter, shook his head at her, warningly.
“There ain’t nothin’ to it, Mrs. Graham,” he said, under his breath; “he’s—” He tapped his forehead significantly.
“Oh, man!” Nathaniel cried out, passionately, “you don’t know what you say! Are the souls of the departed ‘nothing’? I have it in my hand—right here in my hand, Lizzie Graham—to give the world the gift of sight. And they won’t give me a crust of bread and a roof over my head till I can offer it to them!”
“Couldn’t somebody put it together for you?” she asked, the tears in her eyes. “I would try, Nathaniel;—you could explain it to me; I could come and see you every day, and you could tell me.”
His face brightened into a smile. “No, kind woman. Only I can do it. I can’t see very clearly, but there is a glimmer of light, enough to get it together. But it would take at least two months; at least two months. The doctor said the light would last, perhaps, three months. Then I shall be blind. But if I could give eyes to the blind world before I go into the dark, what matter? What matter, I say?” he cried, brokenly.
Lizzie was silent. Dyer shook his head, and tapped his forehead again; then he lounged out from behind his counter, and settled himself in one of the armchairs outside the office door.
Nathaniel dropped his head upon his breast, and sunk back into his dreams. The office was very still, except for two bluebottle flies butting against the ceiling and buzzing up and down the window-panes. A hot wind wandered in and flapped a mowing-machine poster on the wall; then dropped, and the room was still again, except that leaf shadows moved across the square of sunshine on the bare boards by the open door. When Lizzie got up to go, he did not hear her kind good-by until she repeated it, touching his shoulder with her friendly hand. Then he said, hastily, with a faint frown: “Good-by. Good-by.” And sank again into his daze of disappointment.