A BUD FADING.
A second summer went by with its long, hot days, when the sun seemed to
stand still in the sky, and to dart down its most sultry beams into the
dustiest and closest streets. Out in the parks, and in the broad
thoroughfares where the fresh breeze could sweep along early in the
morning, and in the evening as soon as the air grew cooler, it was very
pleasant weather; and the people who could put on light summer dresses
enjoyed it very much. But away among the thickly-built and crowded
houses, where there were thousands of persons breathing over and over
again the same hot and stagnant atmosphere, it seemed as if the most
delicate and weakly among them must be suffocated by the breathless heat.
Old Oliver suffered very greatly, but he said nothing about it; indeed he
generally forgot the cause of his languor and feebleness. He never knew
now the day of the week, nor the month of the year. If any one had told
him in the dog-days of July that it was still April, he would only have
answered gently that it was bright, warm weather for the time of year.
But about old times his memory was good enough; he could tell long
stories of his boyhood, and describe the hills of his native place in
such a manner as to set Tony full of longings after the country, with its
cornfields, and meadows, and hedge-rows, which he had never seen. He
remembered his Bible, too, and could repeat chapter after chapter
describing his Master's life, as they sat together in the perpetual
twilight of their room; for now that it was summer-time it did not seem
right to keep the gas burning.
Tony's crossing had failed him altogether, for in dry weather nobody
wanted it; but in this extremity Mr. Ross came to his aid, and procured
him a place as errand-boy, where he was wanted from eight o'clock in the
morning till seven at night; so that he could still open old Oliver's
shop, and fetch him his right papers before he went out, and put the
shutters up when he came back. To become an errand-boy was a good step
forwards, and Tony was more than content. He never ran about bare-headed
and barefooted now as he had done twelve months before; and he had made
such good progress in reading and writing that he could already make out
the directions upon the parcels he had to deliver, after they had been
once read over to him. He did not object to the dry weather and clean
streets as he had done when his living depended upon his crossing; on the
contrary, he enjoyed the sunshine, and the crowds of gaily-dressed
people, for he could hold up his head amongst them, and no longer went
prowling about in the gutters searching after bits of orange-peel. He
kicked them into the gutters instead, mindful of that accident which had
befallen him, but which turned out so full of good for him.
[Illustration: DOLLY'S MONTHLY REGISTER.]
But, if there had been any eye to see it, a very slow, and very sad
change was creeping over Dolly; so slowly indeed, that perhaps none but
her mother's eye could have seen it at first. On the first of every
month, which old Oliver knew by the magazines coming in, he marked how
much his little love had grown by placing her against the side-post of
the door, and making a thick pencil line where her curly head reached to.
He looked at this record often, smiling at the rate his little woman was
growing taller; but it was really no wonder that his dim eyes, loving as
they were, never saw how the rosy colour was dying away out of her
cheeks, as gradually as the red glow fades away in the west after the sun
has set, nor how the light grew fainter and fainter in her blue eyes,
until they looked at him very heavily from under her drooping eyelids.
The house was too dark for any sight to see very clearly; the full,
strong, healthy light of the sun, could not find its way into it, and day
after day Dolly became more like one of those plants growing in shady
places, which live and shoot up, but only put out pale and sickly leaves,
and feeble buds. One by one, and by little and little, with degrees as
small as her own tiny footsteps, she lost all her merry ways, dropping
them, here one and there another, upon the path she was silently
treading; as little children let fall the flowers they have gathered in
the meadows, along their road homewards. Yet all the time old Oliver was
loving and cherishing her as the dearest of all treasures, second only to
the Master whom he loved so fully; but he never discovered that there
was any change in her. Dolly fell into very quiet ways, and would sit
still for hours together, her arm around Beppo, and her sweet, patient
little face, which was growing thin and hollow, turned towards the
flickering light of the fire, while Oliver pottered toilsomely about his
house, forgetting many things, but always ready with a smile and a fond
word for his grand-daughter.
Just as Oliver was too old to feel any anxiety about Dolly, so Tony was
too young, and knew too little of sickness and death. Moreover, when he
came home in the evening, full of the business of the day, with a number
of stories to tell of what had happened to him, and what he had seen,
Dolly was always more lively, and had a feverish colour on her face, and
a brilliant light in her eyes. He seemed to bring life and strength with
him, and she liked him to nurse her on his knee, which did not grow tired
and stiff like her grandfather's. How should Tony detect anything amiss
with her? She never complained of feeling any pain, and he was glad for
her to be very quiet and still while he was busy with his lessons.
But when the summer was ended, and after the damp warm fogs of November
were over, and a keen, black frost set in sharply before Christmas--a
frost which had none of the beauty of white lime and clear blue skies,
but which hung over the city like a pall, and penetrated to every
fireside with an icy breath; when only the strong and the healthy, who
were well clothed and well fed, could meet it bravely, while the
delicate, and sickly, and poverty-stricken, shrank before it, and were
chilled through and through, then Dolly drooped and failed altogether.
Even old Oliver's dull ears began to hear a little cough, which seemed to
echo from some grave not very far away; and when he drew his little love
between his knees, and put on his spectacles to gaze into her face, the
dearest face in all the world to him, even his eyes saw something of its
wanness, and the hollow lines which had come upon it since the summer had
passed away. The old man felt troubled about her, yet he scarcely knew
what to do. He bought sweetmeats to soothe her cough, and thought
sometimes that he must ask somebody or other about a doctor for her; but
his treacherous memory always let the thought slip out of his mind. He
intended to take counsel with his sister when she came to see him; but
aunt Charlotte was herself very ill with an attack of rheumatism, and
could not get up to old Oliver's house.