She knew what she
had seen. Besides, her disease increased upon her. Almost from minute to
minute she grew more restless, and her increasing inattention to what
I said frightened as well as hurt me. The medicines of Dr. Nash were
useless. Before noon I sent for Dr. Bagford, who said it was decidedly
brain-fever,--that she must be leeched, and have ice at her head, and so
forth.
Ah, it was useless. She grew worse and worse; passed through one or two
long terrible days of frantic misery, crying and protesting against
false accusations with a lamenting voice that made us all cry, too; then
lay long in a stupid state, until the doctor said that now it would
be better for her to die, because, after such an attack, a brain so
sensitive would be disorganized,--she would be an idiot.
Her poor mother came and helped us wait on her. But neither care nor
medicine availed. Bridget died; and the funeral was from our house.
I was surprised by the lofty demeanor of Father MacMullen, the Irish
priest, the first I had ever met: a tall, gaunt, bony, black-haired,
hollow-eyed man, of inscrutable and guarded demeanor, who received with
absolute haughtiness the courtesies of my husband and the reverences of
his own flock. A few of his expressions might indicate a consciousness
that we had endeavored to deal kindly with poor little Bridget.
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