“He is my lover. Is he ill?”
“He is very ill. He came in all in rags, dirty and penniless—he is very ill indeed. Prepare yourself. He is dying of pneumonia.”
I told you before what they call it.
Lily sat at the bedside of the dying man.
“It is all over,” he whispered. “I have reformed, Lily. I have quite turned over a new leaf. I have now resolved to taking the pledge. Kiss me, dear, and tell me that you forgive me.”
“Yes, yes, Charley. God knows that I forgive you. Why, you will come back to yourself in a very little while. Thank God for it, dear! Your own true self. You will be my dear old boy again—the boy that I have always loved; not the drinking, bad boy—the clever, bright boy. Oh, my dear, my dear! you will see mother again very soon, and she will welcome her boy, returned to himself again.”
“Yes,” he said, “that’s it. A serious reform this time. Lily, I dare say I shall be up and well again in a day or two. Then we will see what to do next. I am going out to Australia, where everybody has a chance—America is a fraud. I shall get rich there, and then you and mother will come to me, and we shall get married, and—oh! Lily, Lily, after all that we have suffered, we shall have—I see that we shall have”—he paused, and his voice grew faint—“we shall have—the most splendid time!”
“He is gone,” said the nurse.