I broke off the small, pale roses
and placed them in her grasp. But Mr. Jelnik took from his breast a
pearl and silver crucifix, and this, reverently, he laid upon hers.
"It was my father's grandmother's. She held it when she was dying.
She was an old saint. It would please her to know that her crucifix
should stay, one holy thing, with Jessamine Hynds."
"'_Verily, the gate of repentance is not nor shall be shut upon
God's creatures until the sun shall rise in the west_,'" The Jinnee
quoted his Prophet And he broke off two of his _saphies_, each with
a holy verse written upon it, and dropped them upon her out of pure
charity.
Daoud, who was intelligent and orthodox where Achmet was emotional
and tender, was evidently not altogether sure of the wisdom of this
proceeding; but he was not too orthodox to stand up arrow-straight,
face the East, and pray for her.
So we wrapped her, brown silk dress and yellowed laces, and long
black hair, in the strip of canvas, and gave her to the earth. The
last thing we saw, thank God! before the blanket fell over her for
the last time, was the silver crucifix shining out of the roses in
her hands.
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