My Brother Author:Aubrey Beardsley, Vincent Brown Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: Ill He shut the door behind him, very softly; and having placed his blackthorn in a corner, put his hat on the floor beside it, and then : " Good day, Mrs May... more »," said he. The elderly woman seated on a stool by the fire looked round at him with troubled eyes, but made him no answer. Some one was weeping in the bedroom. "Mrs May " " Paul," she said, " I'm glad you've come." She seemed not to wish to let him see her face. The bedroom door was shut, and the weeping was less violent after Paul entered the living-room. There were now low sobs, as though a person were lying with face hid in bedclothes. Paul stood silent awhile. "Mrs May " " I'm glad you've come, Paul," she said again. "Won't you sit down, Paul." The invitation lacked urgency; but Paul knew that he was welcome. This had been to him a kind of second home ; Mrs May had dressed his mother for burial. He sighed as he took the chair opposite to her on the hearth. Mrs May began to put bits of wood on the fire. She was a worn, thin, weary woman ; as she leaned towards the fire Paul's gaze rested on her shoulders, and he saw how the blades came out in sharp angular outline under the small black shawl she was wearing. In her hands and wrists, when he looked at them, he read a pathos still more acute. She stooped to blow the fire, and at that moment Paul had a vision of a Figure kneeling in a garden by the Syrian shore. The weeping in the next room gave intensity to his inward sight, a poignant note to his sympathy. " You say you're glad I've come, Mrs May." "Yes, Paul. It's about Lizzie." Mrs May turned to him : hers was a long, serious, sad face, full of the dignity of reticent suffering: a face on which one might expect to see a smile of gratitude when at last its tired eyes should look on death. ...« less