She shuddered and continued to gaze. Ah, my God! the irony of those skeletons’ posture,—the grin of each skull as though in mirthless derision of the endearing, caressing grasp of the long and stirless arms!
‘Oh, Charles!’ exclaimed Laura in a whisper of awe and grief, ‘is love no more than that?’
‘Yes, love is more than that,’ I answered softly, conducting her, now no longer reluctant, to the door; ‘there is a noble saying, Where we are death is not; where death is we are not. Death is yonder and so love is not. But that love lives, horrible as the symbol of it is—it lives, let us believe! and where it is death is not. Would Lady Monson like to view this sight?’
‘It is a moral to break her heart,’ she answered; ‘she would not come.’
She went towards her sister thoughtfully.
‘There’s nothing here, men,’ said I, returning.
‘Them poor covies’ll frighten the ladies,’ said Dowling, eyeing the skeletons with his head on one side; ‘better turn ’em out of this.’
‘Let them rest,’ said I. ‘The ladies will not choose this cabin now to lie in.’
‘If them bones which are a-hugging one another so fondly to-day could talk,’ said Cutbill, ‘what a yarn they’d spin!’
‘Pooh,’ said I, ‘I’ve had enough of this cabin,’ and with that I walked right out.