, as I took a swift
survey of the room. But presently my gaze was arrested, and all thought
of pictures hung awry ceased; for there, in a darkened corner of the
room, I traced the rigid outlines of a human figure concealed beneath a
sheet.

"You brought these to put round the corpse?" Mrs. Blake questioned,
suddenly bringing me back from my startled reverie.

"Yes, if you would care for them."

She lifted them out of the basket with a tenderness that surprised me,
and placed them in water; she sat looking at them intently.

"Do you admire flowers?" I asked.

"Oh, yes; but they're useless things, I s'pose. No good once they're
wilted."

"But they are perfect while they last."

"Yes, and I allus feels sorry for the poor things, when I see 'em put
round a corpse and buried in the ground; may be they have more feeling
than we allow for."

She spoke so sadly, I felt my eyes moisten; but whether it was out of
pity for the flowers, the poor dead woman lying opposite, or my friend
Mrs. Blake, who seemed strangely subdued, I could not tell.

"She was gone when I got here," she said, nodding her head at the corpse.
"Dan'el's terrible cut up; it minds me so of the time we lost our first
baby. I had to do everything then and I've got to do the same now."

"I presume she was a very good wife."

"I don't know. Men generally frets hardest after the uselessest ones. I
s'pose it's because they're easy-going and good-natured; but laws, I
mustn't be hard. Mother-in-laws don't see with their children's eyes. I
often think, in some ways, 'twould be best for one generation to die off
afore the next takes their place. It's a mercy we don't live like they
did in the first of Bible times. For poor women folk's life ain't much
after fifty any way, specially if they're depending on their children.
Hard work, shoved in a corner, and the bite you eat begrudged you."

"Surely you don't speak from experience," I gasped, quite horrified.

"Me? Oh, no. I've managed better'n most in my way of life. I help,
instead of getting help. But I'm not thinking of myself all the time.
I see other women's hardships, and pity 'em too."

She turned the conversation abruptly by asking:

"Would you like to see the corpse?"

I certainly wished to see almost anything on earth rather than that; but,
lest I should be offending the proprieties, I followed her and stood
beside the still, outstretched form. She turned down the sheet when, for
an instant,