The sun gone down,
Darkness be over me,
My rest a stone,
Yet in my dreams I’d be
Nearer, my God, to thee,
Nearer to thee!”
Before the singer had finished the first verse there was not a dry eye in the room. Several boys swallowed hard and tried to hide their emotion, but it was useless.
It was all Mike could do to keep to his task, for the spell of the Scout Master’s words was upon him and he could not wholly resist the enthralment of his own voice. At the moment of finishing the second verse, Isaac Rothstein hurriedly covered his face with his hands and sobbed as if his heart was breaking. His grief was so deep that the others looked pityingly toward him, and the singer himself was overcome for the moment. He started on the third stanza, but his voice broke, and he stood trying bravely to pull himself together.
Young Rothstein, with one hand over his face reached up the other and seized the fingers of Mike. Amid his sobs he faltered:
“That man who led the singing was my father!”