THE STUDENTS JOURNAL.
11
sociable a nature ever to enjoy much of his own company, and so, while his wife was taking her daily nap, he would run out and see his friends, and then he would always have some bright and interesting news to carry back to her.
But death is no respecter of persons. He stalked into Uncle Dick's home and stretched out his long bony hands for Uncle Dick's greatest treasure. Uncle Dick sought to ward him off, he tried to keep between him and the little woman whose life was closely linked to his own: but in vain, she was snatched out of his embracing arms.
It was a critical moment for Uncle Dick. All his friends felt that his life must be wrecked from now on: that his affectionate heart could not long endure grief. For the first few hours, indeed he seemed stunned by the blow: but after that he rallied all his strength and went about the house, seeing that everything was done in a manner that his wife could not have failed to approve. He did not care to talk. When he found nothing more to do, he went into a room by himself, and paced up and down incessantly for several hours. He was thinking very hard.
I did not cease to feel anxious about Uncle Dick until after the funeral. The next day he came in to see me. It was pitiful, and yet it brought me great relief, to see him trying to call up his usual cheerful manner. He told me in a few short sentences that his wife would want him to go in the same old way, and to be cheerful and so he was going to do it. And he kept his word. Never after that day did any one see him gloomy or depressed: he had always the same bright, cheerful manner. No one knew, of course, what happened to him within the privacy of his own home; but he kept up his round of calls and in them, though he was silent, he was never morose.
As years rolled by and Uncle Dick was still the same busy little man. He continued to live by himself, and all the necessary housework himself, and kept his little home as neat as his wife had kept it. He was often invited out to dinner, but only rarely would he go.
"Can't leave the house alone," he used to say, with a comical assumption of matronly dignity. As Thanksgiving day drew near, I began to plan to have Uncle Dick spend it with us. I knew it would be a sorrowful
day for him, because it was the the anniversary of his wife's death: and I was afraid his courage would break down if he were left to himself. But when I asked him he responded with a frank but cheerful refusal of my invitation.
"Going to have a Thanksging myself!"
"But, Uncle Dick, it isn't worth while to get a Thanksgiving dinner just for one person." I answered remonstrating with him. Then he turned upon me with such a solemn, earnest look that I dared not say anything more.
"Can't do it; can't do it." But in a moment his old cheerfulness had returned and he added, as he went away:
"Things all ordered."
I felt considerably worried about Uncle Dick, but at the same time I was curious to know what he was going to do as I saw extra provisions carried in, and Thanksgiving morning I could hear Uncle Dick bustling about the kitchen. A thousand fantastic thoughts began to torment me. I felt sure that something was going to happen to him. Could it be possible that he would commit suicide? Of course it was a ridiculous idea! But I fancied I knew better than any one else how intensely he had suffered during the last year, and I thought I had seen him growing weak under it. I knew, to, that his cheerfulness was merely perfunctory; that his heart was broken, and that he was living on only in the hope that soon death would come for him, too.
I tried not to give myself up to such thoughts, but by the time our dinner was over I felt their force so keenly that I could not forbear running in to see how he was fixing up a dainty little dish by way of an excuse. I went over and rapped at the dining-room door. I heard no response to my rap, and, after listening a few moments for some noise within, I quietly opened the door and looked in.
The room was in perfect order, the table was not only set, but had on it as nice a dinner as any one could wish. Uncle Dick was there too, sitting in his accustomed place, and there was another place fixed at the other end of the table. Uncle Dick was sitting perfectly still his hands clasped upon the table, his eyes closed. Evidently he had not heard me. My heart leaped with a foolish bound: was he dead? No. for in a mo-