The Argosy — page 186: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

1 HE Lae Y 8262) LN’. A Story oF NEw YEAR’S EVE. I. ee DY, though barely three o’clock, the gas in the shops was lighted ; the shops still decked in their Christmas trappings, and thronged by happy faces intent on New Year’s gifts. The New Year—so soon expected—seemed hovering in the air; even work- houses had caught a gleam of hope. ‘““You must mind and get well enough to eat some roast beef at the feast to-morrow,” said the nurse, passing swiftly down the whitewashed ward of one of their infirmaries. She was young and rosy-cheeked —a favourite—and the patients looked at her and chuckled. “You too, she said, going on to the farthest bed: ‘‘I shall look out for one of the primest cuts for you.” Two deep dark eyes looked up at her from a white and wasted face. A long bony hand was outstretched to clasp her dress. ‘““Stoop down—I want to speak to you,” said a hollow voice, just able to make itself heard. “All mght—it will be a treat to hear you for once. You don’t trouble us with much of your tongue! ” Her laugh was careless, but it broke suddenly off as she inspected the patient more closely. A male patient, on the shady side of middle age—his dark hair dashed with gray—his burning eyes the brighter from the whiteness of his face. ‘Nurse, I’m going at last—and you’ve been good to me—you'll grant me one last favour ?” ‘“What is it?” asked the young woman, kneeling at his side. It was true, she saw. He was going. She knew the signs only too well. ‘““'This— ” and his dying hand plucked feebly at a narrow black cord about his neck—‘‘ See—I’ll show it to you—I’ve worn it thirty years, as I wear it now. You see it?” She bent nearer to examine the object through which the cord was strung. He had drawn it up for her inspection, from the spot close to his heart where it had rested. “Well now!” ejaculated the nurse, restoring it after a lengthened survey, and smoothing the sheet over the wasted form, with a tender hand, rough though it was: ‘‘There’s a tale belonging to that, I’ll be bound,” she added, looking, with a softer interest, at the shadowy features. ‘They were finely moulded. Yes, he had been a handsome man, once. ‘Tall and broad, too, he must have been. And like a gentleman, somehow. And dying in a workhouse infirmary ! COnniclooolkKks mM