Like his, I thought sadly. Like mine. I shut my eyes to blot the unwelcome orange gaiety of sunshine, and was again beside him on the bed. For a long hour, I had knelt there, my head against his side, his wasted hand stretched out and resting in my hair. Behind me, the nurse sat asleep in her chair, the lamp turned quite low. Mama had finally dropped off to sleep herself in the adjoining room, though through the open doorway I could hear how fitful was her sleep. My father’s touch seemed nearly weightless, and nothing stirred in the shadowed room but the hand upon the mantel clock ticking away indefatigable time. Toward the dawn, I felt him move, and raising my head, I saw that Papa whispered into the dark, his lips working and his poor dry mouth framing words I could not hear. I stood quickly and dipped my handkerchief into the pitcher by his head, then dabbed a bit of moisture around his lips and onto his tongue. He paused and his eyes looked up into mine.

I could not bear the sense I had that he stared at me from across the widening gap between us, and I leaned my face down close to his to whisper, “Papa.” He shut his eyes slowly and then opened them. He looked at me for a long while and then began again the effort to speak.

I leaned closer and laid my ear near his lips, and heard now, faintly, “Bury her.”

“Who, Papa?” I asked softly.

He closed his eyes. “Words.”

I placed my head upon his chest, the tears starting to spill slowly over onto my cheeks. “Words,” he whispered again.

“Bury me.” Then he seemed to strengthen and put his hand upon my head as if to hold me to his heart, and the dismal beat I heard chimed against those two strange words he had whispered. I wept steadily against him, my hands wrapped around his neck, my ear, my cheek, my very being listening to the life within him fade.

“Bury me—”

I raised my head and a great sob burst free, my tears now falling upon his blankets.

“Here,” he said at the last.

Only that.