A Dead Woman Secret

The woman had died without pain quietly as a woman should whose life

The woman had died without pain quietly as a woman should whose life had been blameless. Now she was resting in her bed lying on her back her eyes closed, her features calm her long white hair carefully arranged as though she had done it up ten minutes before dying. The whole pale countenance of the dead woman was so collected so calm so resigned that one could feel what a sweet soul had lived in that body what a quiet existence this old soul had led how easy and pure the death of this parent had been.

Kneeling beside the bed her son a magistrate with inflexible principles and her daughter Marguerite known as Sister Eula lie were weeping as though their hearts would break. She had from childhood up armed them with a strict moral code teaching them religion without weakness and duty without compromise. He the man, had become a judge and handled the law as a weapon with which he smote the weak ones without pity. She the girl influenced by the virtue which had bathed her in this austere family had become the bride of the Church through her loathing for man.