Meantime, poor Ellen waited anxiously in the cavern, and as soon as the
first possible moment for Paulett's return was passed, her fears grew
strong. There was so much danger for him in the bare desert, with his
scanty supply of water, that she might well listen to fear as soon as it
had any reason to make itself heard; and with this dread, when she next
drew water from her scanty supply, came the horrible torment of the
anticipated death by thirst, which seemed descending upon her children
and her. The day she had thought he would return rose and set, and so
did another and another; and from fearing, she had begun to believe,
indeed, that Paulett's earthly hours were passed. Yet hope would not be
subdued entirely; and then she felt that perhaps by prolonging their
lives another day only, she should save them to welcome him, and to
profit by his hard-earned treasure. The store of water was sacredly
precious. She dealt it out in the smallest portions to her children, and
she herself scarcely wetted her lips; she hardened her heart to see her
boy's pale face, her girl's feverish eye; she checked even the motherly
tenderness of her habits, lest the softening of her heart should
overcome her resolution; and so she laid them in their beds the third
night of her dread, when indeed there was scarce another day's supply.
She herself lay on hers, but deadly anxiety kept her from sleeping, and
her ears ached with the silence which ought to have been broken by a
step. And at last, oh joy! there was a foot--yes, a few moments made
that certain, which from the first indeed she believed, but which was so
faint that it wanted confirmation to her bodily sense. Up sprang Ellen,
and darted to meet him. She held forward the candle into the air, and,
lo! it was a woman. Ellen screamed aloud; the woman had seen her before
and said nothing, only pressed forward. "Who are you?" cried Ellen; "are
you alive?" "Yes, just alive; and see here," said the woman, uncovering
the face of her young child--"my child is just alive too; give me water
before it dies." "Then my children will perish," said Ellen. "No, no,"
said the woman; "how are you alive now unless you have plenty? All mine
are gone but this one; my husband died yesterday; ours has been gone for
days." "My husband is dead, too," said Ellen, "and I have only one
draught left." "Then I will take it," said the mother, rushing forward.
Ellen caught her and struggled with her; the poor child moaned in its
mother's arms, and a pang shot through the heart of Ellen. "For God's
sake, miserable woman," she said, "do not go near that basin! You are
mad with want; you will leave none for my children. Stay here, and I
will bring your child water. You and I can want, and yours and mine
shall drink." But the desperate woman pressed on; her eyes fixed on the
water, and dilated with intense desire; her lips wide open, dying almost
for the draught. Ellen's soul was concentred in the fear, that the last
hope of her boy and girl's life was about to be lost; she struggled with
the woman with all her might; she screamed aloud; she lost her hold; she
seized a pistol from the table, and close as she was to her adversary,
fired it full at her. The mother fell, with a shriek. Ellen started
forward and broke her fall, and laid hold on the child to free it from
her dying grasp. "Give him me, give him me!" said the mother, struggling
to lift herself up, and stretching her hands out for the boy. The
trembling Ellen stooped to give him to her, but the child's head dropped
on one side as she held him out; he made no effort to get into his
mother's arms. Ellen wildly raised his face, and he was dead too. The
shot had gone through his breast to his mother's, and a little blood
began to steal from his lips. "He's dead!" said the mother, who was
herself passing away. "Oh, my boy!" and then feebly, with her
fast-failing strength, she raised him, after more than one effort, in
her arms, and pressed her lips to his twice, with all the passion that
death left in her. The wasted form of the child lay there, all pale and
withered, the straight brown hair was parted on his thin forehead; the
mother's uncovered breast, where his head rested, was white, and the
hands delicate; the raiment was luxurious; that head had not been reared
in the expectation of dying on a bed of rock. Ellen burst into floods of
tears, and wrung her hands as she stood by, looking on what she had
done. The woman lifted her eyes, and tried to form her lips into a
smile; she no longer felt any vehement passion, and the torment of
thirst was now only one of the pangs of death. Her eyes wandered to the
water, but when Ellen moved to fetch some, she stopped her.
"No; it was for him. He is at ease now. You did right. Don't grieve."
"Forgive me," said Ellen, kneeling down at her side.
"Oh yes! the poor precious babe suffers no more. I was mad; you said
truly in that. I nursed him at my breast till his lips grew dry even
there; we lived not far from your cavern, and I have seen you, and been
glad you had water. We had some. _We?_ Yes, is not my husband dead; and
my boy is dead too! See, there is blood on his face; wipe it away; he
will die else." Ellen's sobs caught her wandering attention. "I remember
now, you killed him; oh, good angel, guardian angel! you have killed
him, and there is only I to suffer. He is gone from this dear, dear
body; I wish it did not look so like him still--and it looks in pain
too--it looks thirsty."
Ellen hid her own face on the mother's shoulder for an instant.--Her
children had awakened at the noise of the pistol, and they were out of
bed and clinging around her; her sorrow roused theirs, and the sound of
their lamentation reached the dying woman's ear.
"There are my children crying. Alas! I thought they had all been dead."
"They are mine," said Ellen. "Yours are at rest, yours _are_ all dead."
"Thank God!" said the mother; and though the words were earnest, the
voice was faint; all the effort of nature was in them, but they came
feebly from her lips. After that, indistinct sounds and murmured names
only were heard; her breath came in gasps, and at longer and longer
intervals; till the faint shuddering of her limbs ceased by degrees,
and after it had been insensible to the world for a while, the spirit
quitted it for ever. Ellen's heart died within her; her senses were
troubled, and she pressed herself in Paulett's arms without knowing when
he came, or being surprised that he was there. "Oh, Paulett!" she said
at last, "I have not done wrong, but it is so dreadful!" Paulett soon
gathered from her all that had happened; and gazed with pity on what had
once been a beautiful form, but rejoiced that it suffered no longer.
Ellen, shuddering, arranged the dress, composed the limbs, and, with a
thousand tears, placed the infant on that breast which had been so
faithfully its mother to the last. And there they slept, mother and
child--the day of trouble ended for both.
"My poor Ellen," said Paulett, "I wish it were thou and my children who
were there at rest!" and Ellen pressed her Charles and her Alice to her
heart, and would have been glad if they had indeed been dead.