She stared at him fiercely. "I do. I want to find him. They were not to blame. I was. It makes the difference."
"Still he was their son."
"He was their son, and they've suffered; but they can rest in spite of their suffering. I can't. They can afford to give up hope because they've nothing with which to reproach themselves. If they were me—"
He began to understand. "I see. If you could find him and bring him back, even if they didn't want him—"
"I should have done that much. It would be something. It's why I pleaded with them to let me stay with them when I suppose the very sight of me must have tortured them. I swore that I'd give my life to trying to—"
"But what could you do when even the child's father, with all his money, couldn't—?"
"I could pray. They couldn't. They're not like that. Praying's all I've ever done which wasn't done by somebody else. I've prayed as I don't think many people have ever prayed; and now I've come to where—"
"Where what?"
The light in her eyes was lambent, leaping and licking like a flame.
"Where I'm quieter." She made her statement slowly. "I seem to know that he'll be given back to me because the Bible says that when we pray believing that we have what we ask for we shall receive it. Latterly I've believed that. I haven't forced myself to believe it. It's just come of its own accord—something like a certainty."