His mother went up to him.
"No better! No change!" she cried, wringing her hands. "Oh, my God! must
I lose him? Must he die?"
He was my unconscious rival; his little life stood between me and all I
valued most, yet I knelt and prayed God, as I had never prayed before,
that He would spare him. I would have given Crown Anstey twice over for
that life; but it was not to be.
"Do not disturb him with cries," said the doctor to his mother; "he has
not long to live."
She knelt by his side in silence, her face colorless as that of a marble
statue, the very picture of desolation, the very image of woe.
So for some minutes we sat; the little breath grew fainter and more
feeble, the gray shadow deepened on the lovely face.
"Mamma!" he cried. "I see! I see!"
She bent over him, and at that moment he died.
I can never forget it--the wild, bitter anguish of that unhappy woman,
how she wept, how she tore her hair, how she called her child back by
every tender name a mother's love could invent.
It was better, the doctor said, that the first paroxysm of grief should
have full vent. All attempts at comfort and consolation were unavailing.
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