e would come and let mamma see him once again, before she
died, if, as we feared, she must die. We had asked him to come before.
He answered our letter--not our mother's--rather kindly, but very
vaguely, putting off his visit, and saying, that he could not for a
moment suffer himself to believe that she would not do perfectly well,
if we did not alarm her about herself, nor worry her with business when
she was not in a state for it. His reply was handed me before her,
unluckily. She wished to hear it read, and seemed to lose heart and grow
worse from that time.

Thus then matters stood with us that July. The sale of our house was
pending--over our kind host's head too! It was plain to me that George
would not, and that Dr. Physick should not, bear the charge of Fanny's
maintenance. So far and so long as I could, I would.

In the mean time, no further examination was made of her lungs. The
Doctor's report was often "Remarkably comfortable," and never anything
worse than, "Well, on the whole, taking one time with another, I don't
see but she's about as comfortable as she has been." I was, of course,
inexperienced. I was afraid that, if she improved no faster, I should be
obliged to leave her, when I went away to work for her again at the end
of the summer vacation, still very feeble, a care to others, and pining
for my care. That was my nearest and clearest fear.

But what did Fanny think? I hope, the truth; and on one incident, in
chief, I ground my hope. One beautiful day--the last one in July--she
asked me if I should be willing to draw her to our mother's grave. There
could be but one answer; though I had not seen the spot since the
funeral. Fanny looked at it with more than calmness,--with the solemn
irradiation of countenance which had during her illness become her most
characteristic expression. She desired me to help her from her chair.
She lay at her length upon the turf, still and observant, as if
calculating. Then she spoke.

"Katy, dear," said she, very tenderly and softly, as if she feared to
give me pain, "I have been thinking sometimes lately, that, if anything
should ever happen to either of us, the other might be glad to know what
would be exactly the wishes of the one that was gone--about our graves.
Suppose we choose them now, while we are here together. Here, by mamma,
is where I should like to lie. See, I will lay two red clovers for the
head, and a white one for the foot. And there, on her other s