Blake shook his head. "No, he's busy. You better go down the road with me."
"He told me—told me to wait for him," said the boy.
"Well, he doesn't want you now. He wants you to go along with me. I've just left him."
Upon this the boy followed obediently, and they walked together over the field to the road. Blake occasionally looked at the unsmiling young face as he cogitated on Gayne's plans for the lad.
"Like it pretty well here?" he asked.
"No—yes—I don't know," was the answer.
The delicacy and refinement of the boy's face, and the utter hopelessness of it, stirred his companion, as he considered the one he had left in the tattered armchair. They walked on in silence until they had nearly reached the little island cemetery. Then the boy's long lashes lifted. He seemed to be gazing at the shafts and headstones.
"Uncle Nick says the—the ghosts don't have far to walk," he remarked.
The carpenter put his hand on Bert's shoulder. "Stuff and nonsense," he said. "You're too big a boy to believe that foolishness."
The dark eyes regarded him. "That's what Mrs. Lowell says. She says God takes care of us."