as wandering, raised her head, and
pointed to the river, now ablaze with light.

"See," said he. "See the steamboats loaded with burning cotton, and the
great ship meeting them; that is a Yankee gunboat! See, it is passing."

"And you didn't shoot? And are the people glad?"

"No, we didn't shoot. You fell and got hurt at the dark turn by the
acacia bushes, where you hang your little lantern on dark nights. Some
one ought to have hung one for you to-night. How did it happen, child?"

"It didn't happen. I did it on purpose. I knew if I got hurt you would
stop and cure me, and not fire at the boats. I wanted to save--to save
the plan--"

While the little old man raised a glass to the child's lips his hand
shook, and something like a sob escaped him.

"Listen, little one," he whispered, while his lips quivered. "I am an
old fool, but not a fiend--not a devil. Not a gun would have fired. I
wet all the powder. I didn't want anybody to say the Riffraffs flinched
at the last minute. But you--oh, my God!" His voice sank even lower.
"You have given your young life for my folly."

She understood.

"I haven't got any pain--only--I can't move. I thought I'd get hurt
worse than I am--and not so much. I feel as if I were going up--and
up--through the red--into the blue. And the moon is coming sideways to
me. And her face--it is in it--just like the picture." She cast her eyes
about the room as if half conscious of her surroundings. "Will
they--will they love me now?"

Mrs. Magwire, sobbing aloud, fell upon her knees beside the bed.

"God love her, the heavenly child!" she wailed. "She was niver intinded
for this worrld. Sure, an' I love ye, darlint, jist the same as Mary Ann
an' Kitty--an' betther, too, to make up the loss of yer own mother, God
rest her."

Great tears rolled down the cheeks of the dying child, and that heavenly
light which seems a forecast of things unseen shone from her brilliant
eyes.

She laid her thin hand upon Mrs. Magwire's head, buried now upon the bed
beside her.

"Lay the little blanket on me, please--when I go--"

She turned her eyes upon the sky.

"She worked it for me--the 'Darling' on it. The moon is coming
again--sideways. It is her face."

So, through the red of the fiery sky, up into the blue, passed the pure
spirit of little Saint Idyl.

* * * * *

The river seemed afire now with floating chariots of flame.

Slowly, majestically, upward into thi