She said suddenly very low, 'He died as he lived.'
"'His end,' said I, with dull anger stirring in me, 'was in every way
worthy of his life.'
"'And I was not with him,' she murmured. My anger subsided before a
feeling of infinite pity.
"'Everything that could be done--' I mumbled.
"'Ah, but I believed in him more than any one on earth--more than his
own mother, more than--himself. He needed me! Me! I would have treasured
every sigh, every word, every sign, every glance.'
"I felt like a chill grip on my chest. 'Don't,' I said, in a muffled
voice.
"'Forgive me. I--I have mourned so long in silence--in silence. . . .
You were with him--to the last? I think of his loneliness. Nobody near
to understand him as I would have understood. Perhaps no one to
hear. . . .'
"'To the very end,' I said, shakily. 'I heard his very last words. . . .'
I stopped in a fright.
"'Repeat them,' she murmured in a heart-broken tone. 'I want--I
want--something--something--to--to live with.'
"I was on the point of crying at her, 'Don't you hear them?' The dusk
was repeating them in a persistent whisper all around us, in a whisper
that seemed to swell menacingly like the first whisper of a rising wind.
'The horror! The horror!'
"'His last word--to live with,' she insisted.
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