Page:The Father Confessor, Stories of Danger and Death.djvu/115

Rh requires my care, and a child, a darling little child."

"You must die!" I cried again. "I will care for your mother and child. You must die and let me live—I say, I will not die."

"You are very ill," was all he said, laying his hand upon my brow. And then, I know not how it came to pass, whether my cry to Heaven or Hell had been answered, or, whatever it was, by some great effort of my will, but I stood by the bed looking down at my own sleeping body. I dashed across the room to the glass. It was the stranger it reflected back—yes, the same high forehead, with fair, wavy hair, the same large, dreamy eyes; but his soul, ah! his soul lay sleeping in that motionless form upon the bed. I turned and left the haunted room, living, living, living!

, living—oh, the joy of it! I had died and was born again. How it came about, what cared I? "Who," I thought, as I bounded down the stairs, "so fortunate as I?"