The bright October sun shone through the open window upon her as
she arranged them with deft fingers, contrasting the various hues
with loving skill, and weaving ornaments for different points in
the bare room of the little country hotel where her brother lay.
He watched her awhile in silence, and then said sadly,
"Yes, my last birthday."
Her lips trembled, and her head drooped lower over her lap, but
she would not let him see her agitation. So she simply said,
"Do not say that, Oscar."
"No," he replied, "I ought not to say so. I should have said, my
last earthly birthday. Sit closer, Sis, where I can see you better.
I want to talk to you."
"Do you know," he continued, as she came and sat upon his bedside,
spreading her many-hued treasures over the white coverlet, "that
I meant to have been at home to-day?"
"And are you not?" she asked cheerfully. "Am I not with you?"
"True, Sis, and you are my home now; but, after all, I did want to
see the old New England hills once more. One yearns for familiar
scenes after years of war. I meant to have gone back and brought
you here, away from the cold winters that sting, and bite, and
kill. I hoped that, after rest, I might recover strength, and that
you might, here escape the shadow which has fastened upon me."
"Have you seen my horse, Midnight?" he asked, after a fit of
coughing, followed by a dreamy silence.
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