Page:The Tattooed Countess (1924).pdf/268

 the pretence and hypocrisy of the mourning guests, the cold, bare, stone crematory chapel were a new horror to the sensitive, imaginative boy. It did not well seem to him that he could bear much more of this; at the time he was not quite fully aware that he was purging his soul of a capacity for suffering of whatever nature.

Just before the slab, on which, in her white dress, she lay, was shunted into the furnace, Gareth placed a bouquet of marigolds under the fingers of her right hand. Then he turned his head. . ..

Returning on the train, he occupied the broad seat with his father. He was silent for an hour before he said, Father I want something.

What is it my boy?

Will you let me dispose of mother's ashes?

I think that would please her, Gareth.

When the cannikin containing his mother's remains arrived, Gareth left the house, bearing the urn tenderly beneath his coat. He walked through the streets of the town, on out through the unpaved roads where the Bohemians lived in their little cottages, past the fine, old residences, with their cast-iron deer and dogs and fountains, and finally, through the cemetery, where, a month ago, he had been with the Countess. As he slowly paced along the gravel walk, he recalled what she had said, that death always brought her closer to life, and he knew now that this was true for him also. For the first