"My friends, myself—my—oh! what sufferings mine have been!"
"There is always hope."
"No, no; none for me. Do you remember the boy that died here?"
"I was not here, you know."
"Why, I was with him at night, and when it was all silent, he cried no more for friends he wished to come and sit with him, but began to see faces round his bed that came from home. He said they smiled, and talked to him; and he died at last lifting his head to kiss them. Do you hear?"
"Yes, yes," rejoined Nicholas.
"What faces will smile on me when I die? Who will talk to me in those long nights? They cannot come from home; they would frighten me if they did, for I shouldn't know them. Pain and fear, pain and fear for me, alive or dead. No hope, no hope!"
The bell rang to bed; and the boy, subsiding at the sound into his usual listless state, crept away as if anxious to avoid notice. It was with a heavy heart that Nicholas soon afterwards—no, not retired, there was no retirement there—followed to his dirty and crowded dormitory.
FOOTNOTE:
[13] Adapted by E. P. Trueblood from "Nicholas Nickleby."