“Well, Lillie dear,” he said, “how are you?”

She put out her little wasted hand; “John dear,” she said, “sit down; I have something that I want to say to you.  I have been thinking, John, that this can’t last much longer.”

“What can’t last, Lillie?” said John, trying to speak cheerfully.

“I mean, John, that I am going to leave you soon, for good and all; and I should not think you would be sorry either.”

“Oh, come, come, my girl, it won’t do to talk so!” said John, patting her hand.  “You must not be blue.”

“And so, John,” said Lillie, going on without noticing this interruption, “I wanted just to tell you, before I got any weaker, that I know and feel just how patient and noble and good you have always been to me.”

“O Lillie darling!” said John, “why shouldn’t I be?  Poor little girl, how much you have suffered!”

“Well, now, John, I know perfectly well that I have never been the wife that I ought to be to you.  You know it too; so don’t try to say anything about it.  I was never the woman to have made you happy; and it was not fair in me to marry you.  I have lived a dreadfully worldly, selfish life.  And now, John, I am come to the end.  You dear good man, your trials with me are almost over; but I want you to know that you really have succeeded.  John, I do love you now with all my heart, though I did not love you when I married you.  And, John, I do feel that God will take pity on me, poor and good for nothing as I am, just because I see how patient and kind you have always been to me when I have been so very provoking.  You see it has made me think how good God must be,—­because, dear, we know that he is better than the best of us.”

“O Lillie, Lillie!” said John, leaning over her, and taking her in his arms, “do live, I want you to live.  Don’t leave me now, now that you really love me!”

“Oh, no, John! it is best as it is,—­I think I should not have strength to be very good, if I were to get well; and you would still have your little cross to carry.  No, dear, it is all right.  And, John, you will have the best of me in our Lillie.  She looks like me:  but, John, she has your good heart; and she will be more to you than I could be.  She is just as sweet and unselfish as I was selfish.  I don’t think I am quite so bad now; and I think, if I lived, I should try to be a great deal better.”

“O Lillie!  I cannot bear to part with you!  I never have ceased to love you; and I never have loved any other woman.”

“I know that, John.  Oh! how much truer and better you are than I have been!  But I like to think that you love me,—­I like to think that you will be sorry when I am gone, bad as I am, or was; for I insist on it that I am a little better than I was.  You remember that story of Undine you read me one day?  It seems as if most of my life I have been like Undine before her soul came into her.  But this last year I have felt the coming in of a soul.  It has troubled me; it has come with a strange kind of pain.  I have never suffered so much.  But it has done me good—­it has made me feel that I have an immortal soul, and that you and I, John, shall meet in some better place hereafter.—­And there you will be rewarded for all your goodness to me.”