FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   342   343   344   345   346   347   348   349   350   >>  
d, leaned on his elbow, holding his hand pressed to his side. The blood still gushed through his fingers. I flew to him, for the Holy circle did not now keep me back; so did the two doctors. Jonathan knelt behind him and the wounded man laid back his head on his shoulder. With a sigh he took, with a feeble effort, my hand in that of his own which was unstained. He must have seen the anguish of my heart in my face, for he smiled at me and said, "I am only too happy to have been of service! Oh, God!" he cried suddenly, struggling to a sitting posture and pointing to me. "It was worth for this to die! Look! Look!" The sun was now right down upon the mountain top, and the red gleams fell upon my face, so that it was bathed in rosy light. With one impulse the men sank on their knees and a deep and earnest "Amen" broke from all as their eyes followed the pointing of his finger. The dying man spoke, "Now God be thanked that all has not been in vain! See! The snow is not more stainless than her forehead! The curse has passed away!" And, to our bitter grief, with a smile and in silence, he died, a gallant gentleman. NOTE Seven years ago we all went through the flames. And the happiness of some of us since then is, we think, well worth the pain we endured. It is an added joy to Mina and to me that our boy's birthday is the same day as that on which Quincey Morris died. His mother holds, I know, the secret belief that some of our brave friend's spirit has passed into him. His bundle of names links all our little band of men together. But we call him Quincey. In the summer of this year we made a journey to Transylvania, and went over the old ground which was, and is, to us so full of vivid and terrible memories. It was almost impossible to believe that the things which we had seen with our own eyes and heard with our own ears were living truths. Every trace of all that had been was blotted out. The castle stood as before, reared high above a waste of desolation. When we got home we were talking of the old time, which we could all look back on without despair, for Godalming and Seward are both happily married. I took the papers from the safe where they had been ever since our return so long ago. We were struck with the fact, that in all the mass of material of which the record is composed, there is hardly one authentic document. Nothing but a mass of typewriting, except the later not
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   342   343   344   345   346   347   348   349   350   >>  



Top keywords:

passed

 

pointing

 
Quincey
 

journey

 

Transylvania

 
terrible
 
memories
 
ground
 

bundle

 

friend


spirit
 

belief

 

secret

 
Morris
 
mother
 
birthday
 
summer
 

return

 

papers

 
Seward

happily

 

married

 

struck

 

Nothing

 

typewriting

 
document
 

authentic

 

record

 

material

 

composed


Godalming

 

despair

 
blotted
 

castle

 

truths

 

things

 

living

 
reared
 

talking

 

desolation


impossible

 

smiled

 

anguish

 

effort

 

unstained

 
posture
 
sitting
 

struggling

 

service

 

suddenly