Page:Adams - A Child of the Age.djvu/254

242 they are, for I don't believe there's any heaven to go to.'

'But what be-comes of them, then?' 'They go into the earth and the air from whence they came.'

'That's horrid!' she said, 'I don't' and began to cough again.

I put my arm round her shoulders, and leant my cheek to hers that was wet.

'What is it?' I said, 'Why are you crying?'

In a little:

'I was thinking,' she said, 'that God wouldn't let us see one another then, perhaps, because we had been so sinful, and because you—because you talked in that way. If you didn't talk in that way, perhaps He would, you know; because I did love you so!' (She had turned and thrown her arms round my neck.) 'Oh, I couldn't do without you! I did try, I did try! But you were so much to me!' Her trembling lips could scarcely finish it.

At last:

'Oh, Rosy,' I said, with a low, choking voice, 'My little Rosebud!' 'Hush!' she said, ' hush, dear. Don't trouble about it afterwards. I don't think God'll be so hard upon us; I don't think He will! And it wasn't your fault, this. It was all my fault; I did it! I knew I did! But I don't mind now. Kiss me, dear; kiss me. It wasn't your fault.'

I kissed her, and straightway the cough caught and shook her poor body through and through; but she would not have me take my arms from round her. And as I felt all this, the thought in me turned to utter fierceness.

We talked no more of these things, except that Rosy told me that last night she had dreamt of being smothered by wreaths of smoke, and could not wake me. We talked of the dear hours in the past, and of the dearer that were to be in the future—by snatches; for her cough was almost ceaseless, and, it seemed to me, more violent than last night. She had, apparently, forgotten about the story.