It seemed a sort of devotional butterfly perched before
the grinning skull, which was bronzed by the enchanted light into warmer
tones of color, as if some remembrance of what once it saw and felt came
back upon it. So also the bare, miserable board which served for
the bed, and its rude pillow, were glorified. A stray sunbeam, too,
fluttered down on the floor like a pitying spirit, to light up that
pale, thin face, whose classic outlines had now a sharp, yellow setness,
like that of swooning or death; it seemed to linger compassionately on
the sunken, wasted cheeks, on the long black lashes that fell over the
deep hollows beneath the eyes like a funereal veil. Poor man! lying
crushed and torn, like a piece of rockweed wrenched from its rock by a
storm and thrown up withered upon the beach!
From the leaves of the breviary there depends, by a fragment of gold
braid, a sparkling something that wavers and glitters in the evening
light. It is a cross of the cheapest and simplest material, that once
belonged to Agnes. She lost it from her rosary at the confessional, and
Father Francesco saw it fall, yet would not warn her of the loss, for he
longed to posses something that had belonged to her. He made it a mark
to one of her favorite hymns; but she never knew where it had gone.
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