It was a fine day, and they had their grain to get in, and even the
women were busy. They set a stoup of water by him, and put some in
his nostrils, and shut the door to keep out the flies. It was no use
to stay there they thought. If you helped a poor soul to give up the
ghost by a hand on his mouth, or an elbow in his stomach, you got
into trouble; it was safer to leave him alone when he was a-dying.

Don Silverio had given the viaticum to the old man the night before,
not thinking he would outlive the night. He now found the door locked
and saw the place was deserted. He broke the door open with a few
kicks, and found the house empty save for the dying creature on the
sacks of leaves.

"They would not wait! They would not wait -- hell take them!" said
the old man, with a groan, his bony hands fighting the air.

"Hush, hush! the holy oil is on you," said Don Silverio. "They knew I
should be here."

It was a charitable falsehood, but the brain of the old man was still
too awake to be deceived by it.

"Why locked they the door, then? Hell take them! They are reaping in
the lower fields -- hell take them!" he repeated, his bony, toothless
jaws gnashing with each word.

He was eighty-four years old; he had been long the terror of his
district and of his descendants, and they paid him out now that he
was powerless; they left him alone in that sun-baked cabin, and they
had carefully put his crutch out of reach, so that if any force