Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 1).djvu/277

 drew out the coffin from its shelter beneath the shrubs, raised it with great difficulty on to the pack-saddle and fastened it there; then once more, with her hand on the mule's bridle, and with the dog beside her silent and subdued, she went back, now not alone, to the grave of the kings.

As she went—the mule patiently bearing the burden of the dead mistress who had fed and tended him for twenty years, rendering his owner this last service ere he, too, should fall away into the uselessness of age, into the darkness of death—Musa looked back once at the open sea.

The rose of dawn was all above her head, the waters lay wide and peaceful in the sweet mysterious light.

Her heart was full.

'Surely she must be glad,' she thought; 'she will be with us, and she will know that I did not forget.'