a year had flown away since that eventful day when fritz had somewhat roughly awakened violet to the fact that she was a little hunchback, and that she was never to run or walk like him or ella; and now everything connected with this little life of hers was changed. the young mother with the fair hair and the blue eyes and the warm, loving heart, had flown away before her little girl. the good lord jesus had called her first, and she was asleep now in the little churchyard beside the church which stood at the end of the street.
she could not shelter nor protect her little girl any more from hurtful words, nor press her to her heart to soothe the pain which they had caused her. she could not sit beside her in the window and read and talk to her till the hours flew by almost unnoticed, so that violet often forgot that her back ached and that her legs were weary.
[pg 17]
it had come so suddenly too—at least to violet it was sudden. she had not noticed the short coughs, or the quick breathing, or the flushed cheeks; only to her eyes her little mother, as she always called her, grew more lovely every day. but one night when she was asleep, and dreaming of a wooden go-cart which fritz had promised to make for her the next day, her father came to her bedside and called to her to awake.
"violet, my darling, thou must awake. come with me to thy mother; she is calling for thee."
"for me," she said, rising up with sleepy eyes and tossed hair. "where is dear mother, and why does she want me in the night?"
her father stooped down over the bed and lifted her up in his arms very gently, for it hurt her to lift her up quickly or roughly; and without answering her he carried her through the doorway into the inner room.
"mother, dear, why dost thou want me in the night?" asked violet, sleepily stretching out her arms towards the bed in which her mother lay.
"is it night?" she replied in a voice which sounded quite strange to the little girl's ears. "john, where is my darling? i cannot see her; put her here, close beside me.—there, sweetest one; lay thy head on mother's breast."
[pg 18]
violet placed her head on her mother's shoulder, and stretching out her little arm, threw it lovingly round her neck. "what ails sweet mother?" she said softly. "art thou sick?"
"ay, sick unto death. mother has sent for her little girl to bid her good-bye. mother must say adieu to her poor sick girlie; but father will love thee, oh, so well.—is it not so, beloved? thou hast always been better to her than many mothers."
"yes, yes," he said huskily; "never fear, thou knowest that i love her."
"and by-and-by she will follow me to heaven. is it not so, john? she will be glad to find me there."
"yes, darling, yes. and now kiss thy little one, and i will carry her back to bed;" for the childish eyes were beginning to dilate with a strange terror, and violet was shrinking nervously back against the wall.
"good-bye, good-bye, good-bye," cried the poor mother, clinging to the little white figure as john lifted her from the bed; "when violet has wings she will fly to her dear mother in heaven, will she not?"
"yes," replied violet, her face brightening up with a broad, sweet smile as her father lifted her in his[pg 19] arms, and she leaned her cheek against his, "beautiful silver wings; but mother must not go to heaven to-night, for to-morrow fritz is to bring me my cart, and mother has promised to put a cushion in it and wheel violet round the room."
her father carried her back to her bed and laid her down, oh, so softly and tenderly, and kissed her with a long kiss, longer than any he had ever given her before, and then he went back into the room and closed the door. violet did not hear anything more. she looked for some time at the beautiful purple sky outside, filled with thousands of shining stars. she saw the roofs of the houses with their pointed gables; and on the top of the chimney opposite she could see the grave figure of a stork standing upright in the starlight beside its nest. she felt sad at first and trembled a little, she did not know why. for why had her mother called her in the middle of the night and said good-bye to her? where was she going? she had never gone away anywhere from her before, and to-morrow she had promised to give her that ride in fritz's cart, and to tell her again that story about the cruel tailor who ran his needle into the elephant's trunk; and violet smiled and forgot her troubles as she remembered how the elephant filled his great trunk at the gutter and splashed it all over[pg 20] the tailor as he sat cross-legged at his work in the open window; and soon, her mind growing more composed, and somewhat tangled with sleep, she thought she heard the tailor crying somewhere outside in the street. she did not like to hear him sobbing; and every time she looked up, the elephant was still shooting up water into the air; but the bright drops which she saw were the stars still twinkling on the dark back-ground of the sky, and the sobbing came from the next room, where her father was kneeling brokenhearted by the bedside on which her little mother lay dead.
