“What is over?” her father asked mumbling his words.
Clarinda sat down in a chair and pulled it over in front of him. Her manner did not change. She kept her eyes fixed upon his face.
“It is over,” she repeated. “Life is queer. Don’t you think so, Father?”
“Yes, yes!” he answered. “What do you mean?”
“You are dying and it is fortunate it is so,” she replied with conviction in her voice.
The old man shrank back further in his chair. He turned his eyes towards her and looked eagerly into her face. He trembled in an agony of fear—he could not understand. He asked himself if in one day there had come such a change. Were the hands of the dead stretched out any more insistently today than yesterday?
“Do I look worse?” he asked pitifully.
“Yes, you are worse. Your hands are worse. Your face is more drawn. I can see a great change,” she replied, following with her eyes the effect of her words. It pleased her that he felt so deeply. Then she added:
“I believe you are dying. I believe that today when the sun goes down you will be dead. You’ve not fought, as you should have fought. You are as weak as I thought you would be.”
“Clarinda! Clarinda!” he screamed.