After an introduction to Signora Mortera, the doctor turned his attention to Celestino, who lay on the sofa pale and agitated:  “Bless my heart! what a handsome lad! what splendid eyes!  Ah! hm! hm! poor fellow! hm!” and he cleared his throat.  “Let me feel your pulse.”

As Celestino turned and gazed on him with mute surprise the doctor proceeded with his examination in complete silence, and then began discoursing about the weather and politics.

“But, doctor,” said my mother, “you have told us nothing about the boy?  What is your opinion? what shall we do for him? what do you prescribe?”

“Whirr! whirr! how many questions!  I prescribe for him a course of early rising, accompanied by long prayer and fasting.  If he shows an inclination for exercise, give him a rosary.  Take away juvenile books, and give him the Lives of the Saints and Martyrs.  Let him remember the days of fasting and abstinence.  Why, bless me! the boy is nothing but heart and brain.  He must be kept cheerful and well-nourished.  Let him be in the open air when it is pleasant.  I will prescribe a little something for him, but his case is beyond all medicine.”

“Oh, doctor, do you really mean to say that he will die?”

“Die?” and the doctor laughed his little cynical laugh.  “Why, we shall all die some day, shall we not?”

“Now, doctor, do be serious.  Is there no hope for him?”

“I don’t see that there is;” and he continued to gaze at the boy’s face as if it had some fascination for him.

Eugenio Noele failed not a week later to send his clerk to make arrangements for the departure of the Morteras.  As the time drew nearer Celestino failed rapidly.  He would lie for hours without speaking except with his eloquent eyes.  Frequently he would kiss a little ring that I had given him, and a few days before his departure I gave him a trinket consisting of a turquoise heart, with a cross set with crystals over red stones, emblematical of the blood and water that flowed from the side of our Redeemer.  This he received with great emotion, and as I tied it to his neck with a ribbon he said, “I will wear it as long as I have life.”

“Does Celestino fear to die?”

“No, signora, not whilst you are near me; and by dying I shall see my brothers and sisters in heaven, and can come and watch over you all.”

“Sweetest child!  It will break my heart to lose thee.”

“Ah, do not weep;” and the boy’s lips paled and his eyelids closed.  I gave him water, and called to his mother to come and speak to him.

“Ah, this child of my bosom! my poor Celestino! must he leave me too?”

“Dear signora, he goes to a world free from such sorrows or cares as yours have been.  He is like an angel even now.”

“Celestino, kiss thy poor afflicted mother.”  Without a word, but with trembling lips, he stretched forth his arms to embrace her, and I stole away, leaving to her sacred sorrow the poor woman who for the moment, forgetting her self-imposed ascetic restraint, was yielding to every impulse of demonstrative tenderness.