Page:While the Billy Boils, 1913.djvu/170

 Mason reached the surface and came and knelt by the other side of the boy.

'I'll, I'll―why―run fur some brandy,' said Tom.

'No use, Tom,' said Isley. 'I'm all bruk up.'

'Don't yer feel better, sonny?'

'No―I'm―goin' to―die, Tom.'

'Don't say it, Isley,' groaned Tom.

A short silence, and then the boy's body suddenly twisted with pain. But it was soon over. He lay still awhile, and then said quietly:

'Good-bye, Tom!'

Tom made a vain attempt to speak. 'Isley!' he said, ''

The child turned and stretched out his hands to the silent, stony-faced man on the other side.

'Father―father, I'm goin'!'

A shuddering groan broke from Mason's lips, and then all was quiet.

Tom had taken off his hat to wipe his forehead, and his face, in spite of its disfigurement, was strangely like the face of the stone-like man opposite.

For a moment they looked at one another across the body of the child, and then Tom said quietly:

'He never knowed.'

'What does it matter?' said Mason gruffly; and, taking up the dead child, he walked towards the hut.

It was a very sad little group that gathered outside Mason's hut next morning. Martin's wife had been there all the morning cleaning up and doing what she could. One of the women had torn up her husband's only white shirt for a shroud, and they had made the