The boy’s face clouded. He understood that look of gentle grief too well.
“He has no father, then?” inquired Catharine.
“No one but me in the wide world.”
The boy took hold of his mother’s garments, and looked lovingly in her face. It was a pretty habit of dependence that he had learned while an infant, that of clinging to his mother’s skirts, and she loved him for it.
These two women, complete strangers to each other, wandered slowly away from the house, talking quietly and sadly, like old friends that could afford to be natural; but by degrees Catharine became restless and slightly perturbed. There was something strange in this sudden confidence with a stranger, that made her thoughtful. Familiar sounds in the voice, a sort of mesmeric atmosphere that had hung about her own childhood, came back. It seemed as if she had known this gentle widow years ago, and the wildness of the idea harassed her. The child, too—his eyes, the pretty curve of his red lips, the pure forehead, all were familiar; she seemed to have kissed them a thousand times; and it was with an effort of self-constraint that she kept from throwing her arms around him.
This strangely familiar feeling was shared by the widow; while the boy gave his hand lovingly to Catharine, and walked by her side silent, but listening to all they said. But he became restless after a while, and looking up roguishly in Catharine’s face, lisped out—
“You so pretty—what is ou’s name?”
“My name is Catharine—Catharine Barr, my little man. Now tell me what yours is?”
“My name is Edward Oakley,” answered the child, “and my papa has gone to heaven, he has.”
Catharine started, and dropped the child’s hand. Mrs. Oakley was looking another way, and did not observe the change in her countenance, but the child saw it, and, thinking that she was cross, hung back and began to search for amusement for himself, while the two women passed on, unconscious that he had deserted them; for the name of Oakley had disturbed Catharine so much that she lost all self-possession. More than once she cast a long, searching look on the face of her companion, and each time became more and more satisfied that her intuition had been correct. She had known and loved that woman in her childhood.