At sight of Vesty with her child and me, Uncle Benny, to whom the
shadows were coming as to the truly sane, without grief or surprise,
touched his unribboned throat with feeble apology.
"I look dreadful," he murmured. That was not troubling him! He had a
secret beyond all that, I saw.
"There 's been ten in to call to-day," he exulted sweetly, with folded
hands of satisfaction, death's bloom high in his cheeks;
"ten!--ahem!--to call."
Vesty looked at me with her sad smile. "It is because we love you,
Uncle Benny," she said, "and you took--take such care of the children.
Who?" she asked, for his mind was on it.
"Mother," said Uncle Benny, since he was sane now, "and"--he mentioned
a number of the living Basins, and went on, in the same tone--"and
Fluke and Gurd."
Vesty looked at him with touching sorrow and despair, being troubled
and not sane.
"They played," he said, his hands moving with the recollection of the
melody; "they played wonderful--but sometimes it was an organ!"
"Good!" I said, Vesty stood so pale. "We are getting health, I see.
We are on the straight road now."
Uncle Benny, hearing my voice, beckoned me.
"All the things in the drawer!" he said, "because you were 'flicted."
His eyes shone lovingly and compassionately on me. "All for you. But
go and see!"
Enough surely to relieve all physical defects! The worn and treasured
blue necktie, for one thing; a little pocket hand-glass, a pin-cushion
devoted to the tender ingathering of strayed and crooked pins, some
sprays of mint and lavender among the rest.
I felt his eyes beaming proudly on me--treasures beautiful from long
habit, now yielded in a spirit so complete and lofty! I brushed the
back of my hand along my eyes, in the Basin way.
"You mustn't feel bad," said Uncle Benny, as I came back to him:
"nature didn't do much for you, but it 's going to be all right. I had
a talk with mother."
"I am glad of that, Uncle Benny."
"Oh, yes! it 's going to be all right." So full of secrets! he spoke
excitedly, with discreetly covered joy; "you needn't feel bad."
He lay back, lest he should say too much. And so, as he, wise, covered
up his sublime knowledge among us, unwise, with smiling lips, he sank
into a sleep.
Uncle Benny, dying, slept with a smile on his lips; and little Gurd,
homeless, fatherless, laid in this poor habitation or in that, humbly
and roughly, slept in beautiful health with a smile on his lips; and
we, unwise, watched dolefully.
"You must not stay," said Vesty. "You are not used to lose your rest.
I am so used to watching, and--I am not afraid. Lunette said she would
come to help me before morning."
Starless, moonless darkness showed through the low window, and the
candle was burning dimly on the table.
"I shall stay," I said. I had a student's knowledge of death. "He
will wake soon, and then--it will be morning."
But Vesty's dear face turned to me with the sorrow of dying.
I was not used to lose my rest. I dozed faintly, with faithfully
sleepless lids. In that east of heavy blackness the candle made a
strange sun. The world, elsewhere so far from heaven, here at the
Basin ascended to it by a common stairway, and little children and the
pure of heart climbed upward without dread.
"May I go?" I said, watching them.
"If a child leads thee," said a voice.
So I looked to a little child, to take my hand, and I saw my mother's
face waiting from above, and the beams of glory narrowed; it was the
candle burning dimly on the table.
"Notely!" I heard a voice calling.