University of Virginia Library

8. Chapter VIII.
Noon at the Death-Bed.

THE noon-day sun, shining coldly into Emily Marvin's
chamber, beheld her with heart uplifted still to the
Father of Orphans, whilst the folded hands of her mother,
clasped closely within her own, seemed, as they rested on
the marble breast, to be a link between dead and living,
even as the unuttered prayer was a union of earth with
heaven.

Mrs. Dumsey had, with kind officiousness, relieved the
sorrowing daughter of the first necessary preparations for
that saddest of all duties, the burial of a parent. Administering
such neighborly consolation as was within her
power, she had already laid out the corpse upon its humble
couch, smoothing the thin hair beneath a white cap,
and arranging the worn limbs, in the last habiliments of
mortality. She now entered, accompanied by a cadaverous-looking
lad, who held a spring tape-measure in his
hand, which he drew out and let slip, with a jerk, to show
his nonchalance, as he glanced from the body to Emily.

“It's the undertaker's assistant,” whispered Mrs. Dumsey,
taking the girl's trembling hand, and leading her

gently from the bed to her mother's arm-chair, while the
white-faced boy began, in a business-like way, to take the
dimensions necessary for the selection of a coffin, pausing,
at each stretch of his tape, to set down a figure, at the
same time slowly turning his head towards his right shoulder,
to catch a glimpse of Emily's face; all the time
whistling, just audibly, like heavy breathing.

“It's a dispensation,” said Mrs. Dumsey, wiping her
eyes with a white and blue handkerchief, and sitting down
beside the orphan, still holding her cold hand. “I'm
often called on quite distressing occasions; an' I've got a
feelin' heart, Miss Marvin, though I says it myself, miss;
and I always says, says I, on sich occasions—it's a dispensation.”

Emily made no reply, and the day-nurse went on with
her well-meant method of administering comfort, by remarking,
in a decided tone, that, “We're all mortal critters,
and liable to go,” at which declaration, the sepulchral
assistant looked over his shoulder, gave a sideling glance,
and continued his ventriloquial whistle.

“A nuss sees a deal o' sufferin' and trials,” pursued Mrs.
Dumsey. “Though I says it myself, as oughtn't to speak
o' oneself, seein' as self-praise don't go a great ways, but
people that knows me, knows I speak what's true, and no
lie—a nuss like me, goin' about, sees an orful amount of
human sufferin's.”

Emily nodded her head, only half-listening to the good
woman's words; and Mrs. Dumsey, encouraged by the
reflection that she was comforting her distressed neighbor,
went on, in the same strain, till the undertaker's agent

had finished his task, and, turning from the bed-side,
approached them, leering stupidly.

“Are you talkin' to that g'rl?” he asked, jerking his
yellow chin toward Emily. “Mighty little she hears—
been a-faintin' this half-hour.”

Mrs. Dumsey bent forward, scanning the young girl's
face, which drooped against the chair-back.

“Dear me!” she cried, greatly agitated, “she's off,
sure enough! Heart alive! why didn't you tell me,
young man?” And, hastily supporting Emily, the nurse
began to rub her head and hands.

“Quick! get some water!” she exclaimed. “Run,
lad!”

“I ain't a errand-boy!” responded the yellow-faced
individual, with a snap of his tape-spring. “You're a
nuss, ain't you? 'Tend to your business, and I'll 'tend to
mine.” And resuming his sepulchral whistle, he sauntered
leisurely out.

“Was there ever!” ejaculated Mrs. Dumsey, amazed at
the stripling's lack of feeling. “Here, you! Matil-da!”
And she stamped her foot upon the floor, to attract some
member of her family, who occupied the room beneath.
“Poor, unfort'nate critter! The dispensation has overcome
her, an' she's gone clean off.” Then, with renewed
vigor, she beat and rubbed the hands of her fainting
charge, alternately pounding with her foot, and screaming
at the top of her voice—“Ma-til-da!—Hen-ri-et-ta!—
Lau-ra J-a-ne!” the sponsorial appellations, respectively,
of her three interesting daughters. But no response
came to her outcries; and, at length, in great excitement,

she withdrew her arm from around the fainting girl,
placed her in a reclining position on the chair, and then
hurried frantically out of the room, and down stairs to
her own quarters, whence, in a moment afterwards, a succession
of yells arose, proceeding from the throats of all
her innocents, knocked desperately to right and left.
This domestic retribution accomplished, Mrs. Dumsey
seized a bottle of hartshorn, and violently retraced her
steps upward.

But what was the astonishment of the worthy nurse, on
reaching the threshold of the death-chamber, to behold
within, standing in the middle of the floor, with eyes fixed
wonderingly upon the fainting orphan's face, a young man,
clad in fashionable garments, and wearing a look of gentility
entirely at variance with the atmosphere of Foley's
Barracks. He appeared to have just paused, as if himself
transfixed at the spectacle before him; but the approach
of Mrs. Dumsey aroused him from his contemplation.

“Beg pardon, madam!” he said, lifting his hat. “I
have intruded, I fear, on your apartment; but” —

“It's not my apartment, sir!” said the nurse, undecided
whether to be displeased or not, as the young gentleman's
demeanor was so respectful. “It's hers!” She pointed,
in saying this, at the bed on which lay the rigid form of
the dead. The stranger started, uttering an exclamation
of surprise.

“It's poor Widow Marvin, sure enough!” cried the
nurse. “If you was a friend of the family, you know'd as
good a critter as ever lived on the face of this ere canopy.
And her poor darter's een'most gone herself! Laws me!

what am I thinkin' about?” she continued, running to
Emily's side, and beginning to apply her hartshorn
liberally.

“I trust you will pardon my intrusion!” resumed the
young gentleman, with an inclination of his head. “I am
extremely sorry! I was looking for Mr. Jobson, who, I
learned, was in the building, and by accident, I—I” —

“O, no harm's done!” said Mrs. Dumsey, greatly won
by the stranger's deferential manner to herself. “Mistakes
will happen, we all know, sir! Mr. Jobson was to
see me this mornin', early—always comes early to me, as
he knows Mrs. Dumsey is a punctooal woman all her born
days.” This information was given in a subdued tone,
while the operation of bathing Emily's forehead went
steadily on. “Mr. Jobson's about the house somewhere,”
concluded Mrs. Dumsey. “They've not all paid yet, I'll
warrant.” This was said with a consciousness that, whatsoever
might be the delinquencies of other tenants of
Foley's Barracks, she, Mrs. Dumsey, was entirely clear of
Mr. Jobson's books.

The stranger lingered a moment longer, glancing at the
bed and at Emily, and evidently anxious to prolong the
conversation; but the duration of the orphan's swoon had
now begun to alarm her attendant, who redoubled her
restorative measures. At the same time, the entire family
of Mrs. Dumsey, including the infant Tommy, presented
themselves in force at the door of the apartment, at
which fatal apparition the gentleman, bowing low to their
mother, backed himself out, his eyes still riveted on the
insensible maiden.

And truly, at this moment, to an admirer of statuesque
beauty, the drooping form of Emily, as it reclined, half
relieved against the chair-back, half supported by Mrs.
Dumsey's arm, presented a beautiful study. The nurse
had ceased those approved modes of proceeding, involved
in clapping the palms of the hands and shaking the arms,
and was now gently bathing the pallid forehead with her
usually infallible hartshorn; and the orphan's face lay,
death-like, against her breast. White, motionless, and
lovely, the milliner's apprentice appeared more like modelled
marble than living clay; for her lips were bloodless,
and, save the long-fringed eyelids, heavily pendant,
and the clustering curls upon her neck, both face and
bust seemed sculptured out in strange and hueless immobility.

“Go down this minute!—what are you all taggin' arter
me for!” exclaimed the nurse, who, at this juncture, had
succeeded in bringing some animation to her patient, by a
continued pressure of the hartshorn bottle to her nostrils.
“Do you hear me, Ma-til-da? Will you take the children
down?”

“They won't mind me!” returned the eldest Miss Dumsey,
with a wriggle of her neck, as she caught hold of
Tommy, who thereupon delivered himself of a war-whoop,
and cried out, “She's pinchin' me!” A diversion in
Tom's favor was made at this instant, arising from the
breaking out of a private feud between Henrietta and
Laura Jane, who simultaneously grasped each other's
hair, and performed a discordant duet, causing the elder
sister to interfere between them; whereat Master Tom

escaped, and took refuge behind the chair near his
mother.

Poor Mrs. Dumsey was at her wit's end; but the eyes
of Emily opening at this moment, withdrew her attention
from intestine broils, and, like a good, tender-hearted
woman, as she really was, she now bent kindly over the
orphan, and whispered:

“Do you feel better, my poor dear?”

“Yes—yes, thank you!—thank you!” the girl murmured,
brokenly. “I was” —

A shiver ran through her frame, and she almost relapsed
into her swoon; but Mrs. Dumsey's ready hartshorn and
sustaining arm, interposed to prevent it.

“Dear heart!” she said, “you are very weak!”

Emily's eyes once more awakened to the sight and her
heart to the sense of sorrow; for the dizziness of returning
consciousness too soon gave place to a more bitter
realization of her desolate position. The nurse, meantime,
had made vigorous demonstrations upon her rebellious
progeny, driving them literally to “outer darkness,” by
swiftly closing on their retreating forms the door of the
apartment; not, however, without a parting injunction
upon Matilda concerning the pacification of Tommy,
whose pipes continued to be audible in the distance.
Mrs. Dumsey then, in a mysterious manner, informed
Emily concerning the recent visit of the stranger gentleman.

“One of the nicest young gentlemen you ever seen in
all your born days, Miss Marvin. 'Pon my word, he was
a figger, in his elegant white coat, and his” —

“Dear Mrs. Dumsey—what is it to me? Did he not
want Mr. Jobson?”

“O! tell that to the marines!” rejoined the nurse,
knowingly. “If you'd seen him stare at you, and so sorrowful-like!
And sich a nice-spoken man!”

Emily tried to rise from the chair, more to escape the
nurse's loquacity than for any object, and her glance wandered
towards the table. Suddenly she exclaimed:

“I do not see it! where—where can it be?” and she
searched hurriedly in her bosom. “It isn't here!”

“Sakes! have you lost anything, child?” asked the
nurse, alarmed at Emily's confusion.

“There was a purse!—it was on the table,” said the
orphan, in an agitated voice.

“I'll be bound, then, that heathenish lad stole it!—the
unmannerly scamp that he was!” cried the nurse, bustling
forward to the table. “Here it was, you say? He's got
it, you may be sure! A rascally villyan, if ever there
was one! Gallus was in his face!”

“It's—don't worry yourself, Mrs. Dumsey!” murmured
poor Emily, sinking back in the chair. “Yet—O heaven!
it was all!” And covering her face with her hands, the
orphan hurst into a flood of tears.

When the daughter of a rich house bends, weeping,
over a departed mother, she may indulge, unrestrained, the
holy privilege of mourning for the dead alone, and her
thoughts, clustering around the beloved one, may entwine
with the memory of a thousand joys, and then soar up, in
hope and trust, following the enfranchised spirit to its
home of light and beauty. With such thoughts, such

unrestrained communion with and for the dead alone, a
mourner's heart is solaced, the bitterness of its grief
assuaged. But to the poor, this is impossible! The desolate
orphan Emily was denied—as those in her condition
are ever denied—the dear consolation of an unbroken
period of secret grief, during which the memory of the
beloved dead may inhabit and purify the heart. Poverty
denied this. The dull, deadening sense of her own
helplessness—her utter friendlessness—weighed upon her
soul, mingling with the consciousness of her irreparable
bereavement.

Mrs. Dumsey sat down once more beside her young
friend, endeavoring to console her. “All you had, poor
child! Is that so? But I'll follow the rascal! I'll
expose him! He must come with the coffin! I'll fix
him! Now, I'll stir about, and get all things ready, and
you, child—you just sit still. No! lie down!—that's
better. You need rest!”

Saying all this in a breath, Mrs. Dumsey began hastily
to arrange an impromptu bed, upon a few chairs which she
placed against the wall, and spread with a pillow and
some clothing.

“There, child! there's a nice bed for you! lie down,
now, do, and try to get a wink o' sleep, and you'll feel
right smart.”

The exhausted girl sank on the couch prepared for her,
and essayed to thank the kind woman; but her lips
scarcely emitted an audible sound.

“Poor thing!” said the nurse, “you're weak from
cryin', I do b'lieve. I'll be bound, a cup o' tea 'll do you

a mint o' good. You won't? Well, now, that's queer!
Well, jes' lie still; and I'll be back directly.”

So saying, Mrs. Dumsey made a rush for the door, and
disappeared, returning, in a few moments with a glass of
some smoking beverage, which she announced confidentially
as “port-wine negus, made o' fust rate stuff.” Emily
turned away, when this was proffered to her.

“Drink it up! It'll make you sleep!”

The orphan touched her lips to the compound, and then
placed the glass on the chair beside her. Mrs. Dumsey
shook her head, in melancholy reproof; and then, bidding
the orphan “go to sleep!” covered her slight form with
the quilt, and sat beside, till a quiet slumber stole over
Emily's eyelids, and wrapt her mourning spirit in forgetfulness.