"But Abigail talks of angels who sat in the empty tomb, and who told them He had risen," replied her father.
Joel, who had overheard this low-toned conversation, got up and stood close beside them. He had begun to tremble from weakness and excitement.
"'THE STONE IS GONE!'"
"Father Phineas," he asked, "do you remember the story we heard from the old shepherd, Heber? The angels told of His birth; maybe she did see them in His tomb."
"How can such things be?" queried Reuben, stroking his beard in perplexity.
"That's just what you said when Rabbi Lazarus was brought back to life," piped Jesse's shrill voice, quite unexpectedly, at his grandfather's elbow. He had not lost a word of the conversation. "Why don't you go and see for yourself if the tomb is empty?"
Abigail had gone into the house with her mother, and now the summons to breakfast greeted them. She saw she could not convince them of the truth of her story, so she said no more about it; but her happy face was more eloquent than words.
All day snatches of song kept rising to her lips,—old psalms of thanksgiving, and half whispered hallelujahs. At last Joel and Phineas were both so much affected by her continued cheerfulness, that they began to believe there must be some great cause for it.
Finally, in the waning afternoon, they took the road that led from Bethany to the garden where they firmly believed that the Master still lay buried.