. . Her last words were that I should lay
the guitar back again on her lap. . . . Oh, damn it, man! it was
everything your damned sneerer would choose to call it. . . . But I
tell you I held my ear close to her breast for hours; and in my
light-headedness I heard the muted music lulling her: and in and out
of her breathing, when she was long past speech--and above the
stertorous snoring of my enemy laid at her feet--I heard distant
waves breaking in a low chime to some words of a verse I had once
quoted to her on a night when her song had made the crews sorrowful
for a while before lifting their hearts again to make them
merry--music to ripple, ripple:"
'--Ripple in my hearing
Like waves upon a lonely beach, where no craft anchoreth;
That I may steep my soul therein, and craving naught, nor
fearing,
Drift on through slumber to a dream, and through a dream to
death.'
"My ear was close to her breast, listening, as the last breath went
out with a flutter . . . and Santa was dead, having conquered me--
conquered me far beyond my guessing; but up to the moment having
subdued me so effectively that my sole kiss of her had been taken,
kneeling, upon the wrist, as one kisses faith to a sovereign, and had
never been returned.
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