I
It was a nice, warm spring day, and the sun was shining high in the sky, traveling west. Now and then, beautiful puffs of clouds sailed gently by like peach-colored boats on a calm blue sea. A flight of larks chased after the clouds, singing merrily to each other as higher and higher they climbed, till they scarcely could be seen at all.
The hospital on the edge of town was quiet; and quiet was the hospital garden, and the patients gazing at the flowers in the garden. In one of the rooms of the hospital lay a little Rich Boy. He was waiting for Death to come get him. Beside him lay a big Saint Bernard, his constant companion; a pair of yellow canaries sang him sweet songs from a cage; and a pretty vase of flowers filled the room with its fragrance.
From across the hall a little Poor Boy smiled at him. He was waiting for Death also, and had been, it would seem, since the day he was born. He had been waiting for Death when small and hanging at his sickly mother’s breast; and later, when he had grown old enough to care for her himself, and work at the big factory with his father, was waiting for him still. So long had he been waiting, in fact, that everybody wondered why Death had not come for him already. “What is taking him so long?” they whispered to each other.
Now this little Poor Boy had no Saint Bernard to keep him company, no pair of yellow canaries to sing to him, and no pretty vase of flowers to scent his room; but when he saw how, like himself, the little Rich Boy looked out from his window at the bright, shining sun and the peach-colored clouds, he felt such brotherly love and kinship towards him that he began to see everything that the Rich Boy had as his own.
II
Drunk on the fragrance of spring, Death stalked the halls of the hospital. Her face was obscured by a long white veil, and she carried a sickle in her ice-cold hands . . .
“Everything must die,” she said to herself. “The young and the old; the beautiful and the damned; the loved and the lost; the rich and the poor; the sage and the fool; the prince and the popper—all must die. It makes no difference to me. For I am an anarchist! I am an equalizer! I kill flowers and birds and men and women and children. Ah, what joy, what fun it is to reap destruction on living things! It is really quite invigorating.”
Thus, spoke Death as she stalked the halls of the hospital. Her face was obscured by a long white veil, and she carried a sickle in her ice-cold hands . . .
But nobody minded. Her words were drowned out by the singing of larks, and the amorous whispering of spring winds.
Death entered the room of the little Poor Boy. The child was gazing at the blue of the sky, so he did not hear Death pass through the door.
“Turn around, little boy,” said Death gravely. “It is time for you to die.”
“Is it really?” wondered the child as he turned round. “Was I ever alive?”
“Were you not aware of that?”
“Not at all! In fact, today is the first day that I even suspected it.”
“What a dim-witted child!” muttered Death to herself. “This is why I hate poor people. Why, they never seem to know whether they are living or dead. And they have no appreciation for life whatsoever. Really, I get no enjoyment from killing them at all!” Then, looking coldly down at the little Poor Boy, she said, “Listen, I will extend your insignificant life in exchange for that of your friend. Do we have a deal?”
“My friend?” asked the child.
“The boy across the hall,” answered Death, directing the sharp point of her sickle towards the little Rich Boy, who was then looking out at the blue of the sky.
“But his life is his own,” said the little Poor Boy. “It has nothing to do with me, and so it is not mine to give away.”
“Don’t get smart with me, little boy. Anything that you love is yours to give away, especially if I say it is.”
“Really?” asked the child doubtfully.
“Yes, really,” answered Death. “Now say that you will give it to me.”
But the little Poor Boy just laughed.
“Ugh!” groaned Death, and she shook her sickle angrily. “Poor people!”
“Forgive me,” said the child. “I am only laughing because I now realize that I am alive!”
“I don’t care why you are laughing. Just say you will give me the little Rich Boy’s life!”
“I am afraid I cannot do that,” said the child. “For if what you say is true, and his life really does belong to me, then I will not hand it over to the likes of you. Rather, I will do everything in my power to protect it.”
“I don’t have time to argue semantics with you, little boy. Either you give me the life of your friend, or I take yours. Understood?”
“Then take mine,” said the little Poor Boy, smiling.
“Ugh!” groaned Death. “Will you give me the life of his Saint Bernard at least?”
“The only life that you will get from me is my own.”
“What about his canaries?”
“No.”
“His flowers, then?”
“I am afraid not.”
“Fine!” shouted Death. “Have it your way!” And she slipped out of the room.
“Ah!” said the little Poor Boy with delight. “How wonderful it is to know that I am alive! And I can feel it, right here in my heart. It is life that I feel. Oh joy!”
III
Death entered the room of the little Rich Boy. But once again, nobody minded, for they were all drunk on the comforts of spring, and dreaming their own sweet realities. The canaries were singing of faraway lands to their friend the Saint Bernard, who was only half-listening and half-plotting to swat a bothersome fly with his tail. The spring winds were whispering sweet-nothings to the vase of pretty flowers, and the little Rich Boy was gazing at the clouds sailing by like peach-colored boats on a calm blue sea.
“Turn around, little boy,” said Death gravely. “It is time for you to die.”
The child turned round, and his thin, small face became as white as a sheet.
“I beg you,” he cried. “Let me live a while longer. Only a little while longer. Till I can no longer see those beautiful clouds in the sky; till the merciful sun has set in the west!”
“Spoiled brat!” scoffed Death. “You are in no position to bargain.”
“Please!” implored the child. “Only let me see the larks return to their nests; only let me listen to end of the song that my canaries are singing!”
Death stood silent for a moment and thought. Then she smiled a faint, wicked smile.
“I will extend your life in exchange for the life of your flowers. Mind that anything you love is yours to give away.”
“You may have it.”
“And that of your canaries?”
“That also.”
“And your Saint Bernard’?”
The little Rich Boy looked heartbroken.
“Look, I haven’t all day,” said Death peevishly. “I am a busy woman. Now, will you give me the dog’s life, or no?”
“You may have it.”
“And what about the life of your friend across the hall?”
The little Rich Boy scrunched up his face in pain.
“Give me his life,” said Death, “and I will extend yours, till you can no longer see the beautiful clouds in the sky; till the merciful sun has set in the west.”
“You may have it,” murmured the child.
Then Death slipped out of the room, and the little Rich Boy buried his pale face in his pillow and wept.
IV
The next day a solemn funeral was held for the little Rich Boy. Family and friends stood round the magnificent coffin, which was covered in a large black pall, and strewn with many pretty flowers. Only the flowers were dead. The mourners looked on sorrowfully as the coffin was lowered into the cold, dark ground.
Around this time, the little Poor Boy was cremated. His bones were tossed into an unmarked box, to be shipped off somewhere—it does not matter where.
Nobody came to pay their respects, save for a young Nurse in a long white veil. She watched the box containing the remains of the little Poor Boy being carried out of the hospital, and her beautiful eyes filled with tears.
“I suppose that I should be going,” she said to herself after a while. “Indeed, I really must be going”; and she walked off silently in the direction of the slums.
“Why, that woman looks just like Death!” murmured the Groundskeeper of the hospital as he watched her pass through the hospital gate. “She even has a long white veil and a silver sickle! Or did I imagine that?”