"What is it?" he asked indifferently.
"He is risen!" she exclaimed joyfully, clasping her hands as she always did when much excited. "I went to His tomb very early in the morning, while it was yet dark, with Mary and Salome and some other women. The stone had been rolled aside; and while we wondered and wept, fearing His enemies had stolen Him away, He stood before us, with His old greeting on His lips,—'All hail!'"
Joel rubbed his eyes and looked at her. "No, no!" he said wearily, "I am dreaming again!"
He would have thrown himself on the ground as before, his head pillowed on his arm, but she would not let him. She shook his hands with a persistence that could not be refused, talking to him all the while in such a glad eager voice that he slowly began to realize that something had made her very happy.
"What is it, Mother Abigail?" he asked, much puzzled.
"I do not wonder you are bewildered," she cried. "It is such blessed, such wonderful news. Why He is alive, Joel, He whom Thou lovest! Try to understand it, my boy! I have just now come from the empty tomb. I saw Him! I spoke with Him! I knelt at His feet and worshipped!"
By this time all the family had come out. Reuben looked at his daughter pityingly, as she repeated her news; then he turned to Phineas.
"Poor thing!" he said, in a low tone. "She has witnessed such terrible scenes lately, and received such a severe shock, that her mind is affected by it. She does not know what she is saying. Did not you yourself help prepare the body for burial, and put it in the tomb?"
"Yes," answered Phineas, "and helped close it with a great stone, which no one man could possibly move by himself. And I saw it sealed with the seal of Cæsar; and when I left it was guarded by Roman sentinels in armor. No man could have opened it."