"What made you, Sabrina? What made you?"
Sabrina hesitated.
"Well," she said, at length, "I guess I got kinder startled. Deacon Tolman run in an" told what kind of doin"s there was goin" to be to-morrow. He was full of it, an" he blurted it all out to once."
"About Senator Gilman coming?"
"Yes."
"And their tr.i.m.m.i.n.g up the hall for him to speak in, and his writing on it was his boyhood"s home and he shouldn"t die happy unless he"d come back and seen it once more?"
"Yes. That"s about it."
"Well," said Clelia, in slow wonder, "I don"t see what there was about that to give anybody a heart-spell."
Sabrina looked at her for a moment in sharp questioning, followed by relief.
"No," she said softly, "no. But I guess I got kinder startled."
"I"m going to stay with you," said Clelia tenderly. "I"ll stay all night."
"There"s a good girl. Now there"s somebody round, I guess maybe I could drop off to sleep."
At first Clelia was not much alarmed; for though Sabrina was known to have heart-spells, she always came out of them and went on her way with the same gentle impregnability. But in the middle of the night, she suddenly woke Clelia sleeping on the lounge beside her, by saying in a clear tone:--
"Wouldn"t it be strange, Clelia?"
"Wouldn"t what be strange?" asked the girl, instantly alert.
"Wouldn"t it be strange if anybody put off their sorrow all their lives long, an" then died before they got a chance to give way to it?"
"Sabrina, you thinking about those things?"
"Never mind," answered Sabrina soothingly. "I guess I waked up kinder quick."
But again, after she had had a sinking spell, and Clelia had given her some warming drops, she said half-shyly, "Clelia, maybe you"ll think I"m a terrible fool; but if I should pa.s.s away, there"s somethin" I should like to have you do."
Clelia knelt beside her, and put her wet cheek down on the little roughened hand.
"There was that city boarder I took care of, the summer she gi"n out down here," went on Sabrina dreamily. "I liked her an" I liked her clo"es. They were real pretty. She see I liked "em, an" what should she do when she went back home, but send me a blue silk wrapper all lace and ribbins, just like hers, only nicer. It"s in that chist. I never"ve wore it. But if I should be taken away--I "most think I"d like to have it put on me."
The cool summer dawn was flowing in at the window. The solemnity of the hour moved Clelia like the strangeness of the time. It hushed her to composure.
"I will," she promised. "If you should go before me, I"ll do everything you want. Now you get some sleep."
But after Sabrina had shut her eyes and seemed to be drowsing off, she opened them to say, this time with an imperative strength:--
"But don"t you let it spile their good time."
"Whose, Sabrina?"
"The doin"s they"re goin" to have in the hall. If I should go in the midst of it, don"t you tell no more"n you can help. But I guess I can live through one day anyways."
That forenoon she was a little brighter, as one may be with the mounting sun, and Clelia, disregarding all entreaties to see the "doings" at the hall, took faithful care of her. But in the late afternoon while she sat beside the bed and Sabrina drowsed, there was a clear whistle very near.
It sounded like a quail outside the window. Clelia flushed red. The sick woman, opening her eyes, saw how she was shaking.
"What is it, dear?" she asked.
"It"s Richmond," said Clelia, in a full, moved voice. "It"s his whistle."
"You go out to him, dear," urged Sabrina, as if she could not say it fast enough. "You hurry."
And Clelia went, trembling.
When she came back, half an hour later, she walked like a G.o.ddess breathing happiness and pride.
"O Sabrina!" She sank down by the bedside and put her head beside Sabrina"s cheek. "He was there in the garden. He kissed me right in sight of the road. If "t had been in the face and eyes of everybody, it couldn"t have made any difference. "You took care of mother," he said.
"I like your mother," I said. "I"d like to live with her--and aunt Lucindy." And he said then, Sabrina, he said then, "We sha"n"t have to."
And Sabrina, he"s been on to New York to see if he could find out anything about the railroad that"s going through to save stopping at the Junction; and he saw Senator Gilman, and that"s how the senator came down here. He got talking with Richmond, old times and all, and he just wanted to come. And the railroad"s going through the ten-acre pasture, and Richmond"ll get a lot of money."
Sabrina"s hand rested on the girl"s head.
"There, dear," she said movingly. "Didn"t I tell you? Don"t cry till to-morrow, an" maybe you won"t have to then."
Clelia sat up, wiping her eyes and laughing.
"That isn"t all," she said. "Senator Gilman wants to see you."
"Me!"
Sabrina rose and sat upright in bed. The color flooded her pale cheeks.
Her eyes dilated.
"Yes. He told Richmond you used to go to school together, and he"s coming down here on his way to the train. And sick or well, he said, you"d got to see him."
Sabrina had put one shaking hand to her hair. "It"s turned white," she whispered.
But Clelia did not hear her. She had opened the chest at the foot of the bed, and taken out a soft package delicately wrapped. She pulled out a score of pins and shook the shimmering folds of the blue dress. Then she glanced at Sabrina still sitting there, the color flooding her cheeks again with their old pinkness.
"Oh!" breathed Clelia, in rapture at the dress, and again at the sweet rose-bloom in Sabrina"s face. Then she calmed herself, remembering this was a sick chamber, though every moment the airs of life seemed entering. She brought the dress to the bedside. "You put your arm in, Sabrina," she coaxed.
Sabrina did it. She moved in a daze, and presently she was lying in her bed clothed in blue and white, her soft hair piled above her head, and her eyes wide with some unconfessed emotion. But to Clelia, she was accustomed to look vivid; life was her portion always. The girl sped out of the room, and came back presently, her arms full of summer flowers, tiger-lilies, larkspur, monkshood, and herbs that, being bruised, gave out odors. Sabrina"s eyes questioned her. Clelia tossed the flowers in a heap on the table.
"What you doin" that for?" asked Sabrina.
"I don"t know," answered the girl, in a whisper. "There"s no time to put "em in water. I want to have things pretty, that"s all. You take your drops, dear. They"ve come."
But Sabrina lay there, an image of beauty in a sea of calm.