Un cuento de Navidad

Cesó de quejarse la pobrecita, movió la cabeza, fijando los tristes ojos en las personas que rodeaban su lecho, extinguióse poco a poco su aliento, y expiró. El ángel de la guarda, dando un suspiro, alzó el vuelo y se fue.

La infeliz madre no creía tanta desventura; pero el lindísimo rostro de Celinina se fue poniendo amarillo y diáfano como cera; enfriáronse sus miembros y quedó rígida y dura como el cuerpo de una muñeca. Entonces llevaron fuera de la alcoba a la madre, al padre y a los más inmediatos parientes, y dos o tres amigas y criadas se ocuparon en cumplir el último deber con la pobre niña muerta.

La vistieron con riquísimo traje de batista, la falda blanca y ligera como una nube, toda llena de encajes y rizos que la asemejaban a espuma. Pusiéronle los zapatos, blancos también, y apenas ligeramente gastada la suela, señal de haber dado pocos pasos, y después tejieron, con sus admirables cabellos de color castaño oscuro, graciosas trenzas enlazadas con cintas azules. Buscaron flores naturales, mas no hallándolas, por ser tan impropia de ellas la estación, tejieron una linda corona con flores de tela, escogiendo las más bonitas y las que más se parecían a verdaderas rosas frescas traídas del jardín.

Un hombre antipático trajo una caja algo mayor que la de un violín, forrada de seda azul con galones de plata, y por dentro guarnecida de raso blanco. Colocaron dentro a Celinina, sosteniendo su cabeza en preciosa y blanda almohada, para que no estuviese en postura violenta, y después que la acomodaron bien en su fúnebre lecho, cruzaron sus manecitas, atándolas con una cinta, y entre ellas pusiéronle un ramo de rosas blancas, tan hábilmente hechas por el artista, que parecían hijas del mismo abril.

Luego las mujeres aquellas cubrieron de vistosos paños una mesa, arreglándola como un altar, y sobre ella fue colocada la caja. En breve tiempo armaron unos al modo de doseles de iglesia, con ricas cortinas blancas que se recogían gallardamente a un lado y otro; trajeron de otras piezas cantidad de santos e imágenes que ordenadamente distribuyeron sobre el altar, como formando la corte funeraria del ángel difunto, y sin pérdida de tiempo encendieron algunas docenas de luces en los grandes candelabros de la sala, los cuales en torno a Celinina derramaban tristísimas claridades.

Después de besar repetidas veces las heladas mejillas de la pobre niña, dieron por terminada su piadosa obra.

Poor little one had ceased to moan; she turned her head slightly and stared with wide eyes at those who stood around her bed; her breath came fainter, fainter, until it stopped altogether. She was dead. The guardian angel uttered a deep sigh, unfolded his wings, and flew away.

The poor mother could not believe in the reality of so much sorrow; still Celinina's exquisite face was growing diaphanous and yellow, like wax; her limbs were cold; and her body finally became rigid and hard like that of a doll. Then the mother was led away from the alcove, while the father, the nearest relatives, two or three friends, and the servants performed the last duties toward the dead child.

They dressed her in a beautiful gown of lawn that was as white and as sheer as a cloud, and covered with frills and laces that looked like foam. They put on her shoes, which were white too, and whose soles showed that they had taken but few steps. They braided her lovely dark chestnut hair, and arranged it gracefully about her head, intertwining it with blue ribbons. They tried to find fresh flowers, but the season was too far advanced, and there were none to be had; so they made her a wreath of artificial ones, selecting only those which were beautiful and which might have been mistaken for real blossoms just from the garden.

Then a very repulsive man brought a box, just a trifle larger than the case of a violin, lined with blue silk and elaborately adorned with white satin and silver braid. Celinina was laid in it: an exquisite soft pillow was placed under her head, so that her position might not seem strained; and when she had been carefully and tenderly fixed in her funereal couch, they crossed her little hands, tied them together with a ribbon, and slipped a bunch of white roses between them, roses so artistically fashioned that they seemed to be the very children of Spring.

The women threw gorgeous draperies over a table, adorned it like an altar, and laid the coffin upon it. They arranged other altars, too, after the manner of church canopies, with fine white curtains, gracefully caught back on either side. They brought a great quantity of saints and images from other rooms, which they disposed with great art in symmetrical groups, forming a sort of funereal court around the departed angel. They also brought in, without losing a moment, the great candelabrum from the parlor, and lighted several dozen tapers, which shed their mournful glow upon Celinina.

Then they kissed the child's frozen cheek again and again, and their pious task was done.